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OTHER  BOOKS  BY  DR.  PECK 


DESERT,  PINNACLE,  AND  MOUNTAIN 
OLD  SINS  IN  NEW  CLOTHES 
RINGING  QUESTIONS 
MEN  WHO  MISSED  THE  TRAIL 
SIDE-STEPPING  SAINTS 
FORGOTTEN  FACES 


CROSS-LOTS 

AND  OTHER  ESSAYS 


BY 

GEORGE  CLARKE  PECK 


THE  ABINGDON  PRESS 

NEW  YORK  CINCINNATI 


Copyright,  1921,  by 
GEORGE  CLARKE  PECK 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


First  Edition  Printed  July,  1921 
Reprinted  February,  1922 


rt 


CONTENTS 


g  I. 

S  11. 

w  III. 


PAGE 


The  Cross-Lots  Path 7 

Taken  for  Granted 21 

Six  Cents'  Worth  of  Paradise 34 

IV.     The  White  Spire [     45 

V.     When  the  Whistle  Blows 57 

VI.    In  a  Looking  Glass 7j 

VII.     The  World  in  Our  Debt 82 

VEIL     The  Back  Road 95 

y5  IX.    Penthouses jqo 

_j  X.     "Say  It — With  Flowers" 125 

^  XI.     The  "Set" U7 

XII.    The  Green  Sign j42 

XIII.  Against  the  Sun j55 

XIV.  The  Old  Covered  Bridge 164 

XV.    When  the  Scaffolding  Comes  Down 175 


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THE  CROSS-LOTS  PATH 

Even  in  the  heart  of  a  city  you  shall  strike 
occasionally  such  a  trail.  And,  having  struck 
it,  you  will  pursue  it  if  you  are  wise.  I  always 
do.  Barring  an  incidental  puddle  on  rainy 
days,  or  threat  of  dusty  shoes,  and  with  just 
adventure  enough  to  add  piquancy  to  your 
walk,  the  cross-lots  path  is  usually  worth 
taking.  Many  a  needless  furlong  have  I  saved 
myself  by  advance  knowledge  or  timely  dis- 
covery of  such  a  short-cut.  Of  course,  one 
is  always  at  liberty  to  make  life  as  hard  as 
possible — for  himself.  The  age  of  the  hair- 
shirt  has  passed,  but  not  the  spirit  of  it.  There 
is  still  left  a  deal  of  entirely  gratuitous  martyr- 
dom. There  are  people  who  will  not  permit 
themselves  to  have  a  good  time,  even  to 
please  God.  They  are  afraid  of  life  at  its 
flood.  Without  the  Covenanter's  trenchant 
convictions,  they  practice  his  renunciations. 
Of  two  open  paths  they  dismally  and  resignedly 
select  the  arduous  one — and  without  reward, 
so  far  as  I  can  discover,  either  in  this  world 
or  the  next.    Duty  is  not  a  god:  it  is  a  gadfly 

7 


8  CROSS-LOTS 

which  merely  stings  them  into  doing  what 
they  prefer  not  to  do.  Their  rule  of  life  is 
not  golden  but  iron.  I  am  sorry  for  them — 
they  have  so  melancholy  a  time  with  their 
virtues,  whereas  I  cannot  conceive  of  a  good 
God  as  even  edified  with  their  sad  performance. 
Ordinarily,  I  suppose  he  prefers  our  smiles, 
our  songs,  our  gladness. 

"The  sorry  prayers  go  up  to  God, 
Day  after  weary  day: 
They  whimper  through  the  eternal  blue. 
And  down  the  milky  way. 

"And  then  a  little,  laughing  prayer 
Came  running  from  the  sky. 
Along  the  golden  gutters,  where 
The  sorry  prayers  go  by. 

"It  had  no  fear  of  anything; 
But  in  that  holy  place, 
It  found  the  very  throne  of  God 
And  smiled  up  in  his  face. 

"So  God  was  comforted.    He  said, 
'There  still  is  hope  for  man : 
One  man  prays  happily.'     And  so 
He  turned  to  care  again."* 

Thus  sings  Louise  Driscoll.  And  thus,  though 
the  phrases  startled  me  at  first  sight,  I  sol- 
emnly believe.    And,  thus  believing,  I  assume 

>By  permiEsioD  of  author. 


THE  CROSS-LOTS  PATH  9 

that  the  cross-lots  paths  in  life  may  be  of 
divine  intent. 

Very  distinctly  and  gratefully  do  I  recall 
such  a  shortening  of  a  tedious  walk  on  a  mid- 
summer day  years  agone.  I  recall  it  more 
vividly  than  my  memory  holds  experiences 
far  more  momentous.  The  thermometric  read- 
ing would  have  satisfied  a  salamander.  My 
traveling  bag  was  unconscionably  heavy.  More- 
over, I  am  not  a  pedestrian  by  choice.  Usually, 
if  I  am  offered  a  preference  between  walk- 
ing and  riding,  I  ride.  "The  Beloved  Vaga- 
bond" or  "The  Amateur  Gentleman,'*  taking 
to  the  road  as  a  duck  to  water,  would  find 
in  me  no  kindred  spirit.  It  was  so  on  the 
day  before  mentioned.  I  walked  of  necessity 
— the  only  alternative  being  to  hire  a  con- 
veyance equipped  with  one  of  those  modern 
joy-killers  called  a  taximeter.  Incidentally,  I'd 
rather  be  gouged  by  the  old-fashioned  hack- 
man  (whose  charges  Mark  Twain  said  were 
higher  than  Niagara  Falls)  than  be  tormented 
by  the  leaping  record  of  a  taximeter — ten 
cents  more  every  time  you  look,  and  twenty 
cents  if  you  drop  your  stare  for  a  moment. 
At  least  you  could  debate  with  the  extor- 
tionate cabby  of  the  old  school.  You  could 
relieve  your  pent  feelings.  You  could  threaten 
even  to  litigate  the  case.     But  what  redress 


10  CROSS-LOTS 

has  one  against  an  infernal  little  mechanism 
which,  in  plain  figures,  fairly  shrieks  the  amount 
he  owes?  Verily,  some  of  our  modern  scien- 
tific contributions  to  exactitude  have  their 
frank  offset. 

But  be  that  as  it  may,  on  the  torrid  day  in 
question  I  elected  to  walk.  Nor  had  I  pro- 
gressed far  before  confessing  that,  were  the 
election  to  be  held  again,  I  should  vote  differ- 
ently. I  perspired  without  limit  and  with- 
out joy.  Pavements  were  blisteringly  hot,  and 
the  rectangles  of  city  blocks  seemed  devised 
for  torture.  O,  for  an  airplane — or  the  next 
thing  to  it!  And  the  "next  thing  to  it,"  and 
at  no  great  remove,  was  an  inviting  footpath, 
cross-lots.  Unwitting  the  hindrances  or  warn- 
ing notices  that  might  be  encountered,  I  hailed 
as  veritably  heaven-sent  that  shortened  way. 
It  climbed  a  hill,  but  I  did  not  mind;  nor  its 
tortuousness  either.  Was  it  not  saving  me 
steps  and  sweat  and  temper?  And  with  a 
greatly  softened  state  of  mind  from  that 
threatening  when  I  hit  the  short  trail,  I  pushed 
the  electric  button  at  my  destination. 

But  that  bypath  over  the  hill  is  only  one 
of  many  traversed  by  me,  first  and  last.  And 
there  needed  but  a  chance  glimpse,  from  a 
car  window,  of  such  a  footway,  to  set  going 
the  mysterious  wheels  of  memory.    Moreover, 


THE  CROSS-LOTS  PATH  11 

it  invited  a  meditative  mood.  Hitherto  I  had 
merely  accepted  such  paths  as  I  found  them. 
Henceforth  I  shall  try  to  hold  them  in  new 
respect;  not  for  their  utilitarian  aspects,  but 
for  their  story  and  meaning.  Every  such  con- 
venience, as  every  printing  press,  every  tel- 
ephone, every  community  betterment,  begs  the 
question  of  a  pioneer.  Time  was  when  the 
field  was  untracked  by  other  than  random 
feet.  Every  former  pilgrim  that  way  had 
followed  the  conventional  route — right  angles, 
flagstones,  and  all  that.  Then,  one  day, 
came  the  pathfinder:  lover,  perhaps,  in  eager 
quest  of  his  mate,  lad  hurrying  home  to  mother, 
messenger  charged  with  utmost  expedition  to 
fetch  doctor  or  friend,  laborer  tired  with  toil 
of  a  day  and  of  his  tool-kit — who  knows  which 
was  the  pioneer?  But  into  the  soul  of  him 
dropped  the  suggestion  of  a  short-cut  across 
fields.  And,  whether  diflBdent  or  defiant,  he 
blazed  a  trail  for  a  multitude  of  later  so- 
journers. 

So  you  have  the  beginning,  as  in  many  a 
different  realm:  simple,  ingenuous,  unpre- 
meditated probably — always  the  pioneer,  al- 
ways the  pathfinder.  The  world  can  no  better 
get  on  without  him  than  it  can  count  with- 
out number  one,  or  spell  with  the  first  letter 
of  the  alphabet  omitted.    Back  of  Herschel  and 


12  CROSS-LOTS 

Galileo  and  Copernicus — Ptolemy  or  some  still 
more  ancient  friend  of  the  stars.  Back  of 
Spencer  and  Darwin  and  Bacon — Plato  the 
trail-blazer.  Back  of  Pasteur  and  Jenner  and 
Harvey — Galen,  perhaps.  Back  of  Wesley 
and  Melanchthon  and  Savonarola — Jesus.  Al- 
ways the  pioneer,  of  course.  And  part  of  the 
charm  of  such  a  beginner  is  his  unconscious- 
ness. Doing  an  epochal  thing,  turning  a  new 
page  in  human  progress,  he  seems  not  to  know 
it.  Your  self-appraising,  theatrical  pioneer  is 
no  pathfinder  at  all.  His  self-importance  gives 
him  away.  It  confesses  for  him  that  he  stole 
his  fire  from  an  altar  of  another's  kindling. 

Imagine  a  Luther  setting  out  portentously 
and  vociferously  to  reform  a  church.  I  do 
not  so  read  the  story.  Primarily,  he  was 
questing  peace  for  his  own  racked  spirit. 
The  great  sequel  was  the  logic  of  his  first 
move  toward  self-amendment,  but  he  did  not 
invent  the  logic  of  it.  Imagine  a  Corot  de- 
liberately planning  to  set  the  style  for  the 
Barbizon  School.  Rather,  he  was  trying  to 
paint  the  thing  as  he  saw  it,  let  others  wield 
their  brushes  as  they  would.  Imagine  a 
Lenin  announcing  himself  as  the  social  saviour 
of  a  world.  Yes,  I  can  readily  imagine  it. 
That  is  his  precise  role — noisy,  reckless,  burst- 
ing with  egotism.    And  so  he  shall  fail,  in  the 


THE  CROSS-LOTS  PATH  13 

far-off  event,  to  lead  a  forlorn  hope  even. 
One  Man  alone  could  be  at  once  both  con- 
scious of  the  sweep  of  his  mission  and  sub- 
limely modest.  When  Herod  attempted  to 
tease  him  into  an  impious  declaration  of  rank, 
"Art  thou  the  King  of  the  Jews?"  the  reply 
itself  was  enigmatical,  "Thou  sayest  it."  From 
no  lesser  son  of  woman  can  we  accept  the 
self-rating  which  oncoming  ages  may  gladly 
accord.  "No,"  protested  Florence  Nightingale, 
when  friends  credited  her  with  genius:  "I 
simply  worked  hard,  very  hard,  and  I  never 
refused  God  anything."  And  she  was  pioneer 
in  a  ministry  which  has  mitigated  the  horrors 
of  every  great  battlefield  since. 

Always  the  pioneer — and  the  honor  of  be- 
ing that.  Once  the  trail  is  blazed,  you  shall 
find  plenty  of  pilgrims  to  follow  it.  Indeed, 
they  will  follow  it  to  death,  at  the  heels  of  an 
inspiring  leader.  Most  of  us,  however,  are 
afraid  to  suffer  and  die  alone.  We  crave 
company  in  our  sacrifices — a  friendly  eye  to 
watch  us  be  brave,  a  commanding  voice  to 
cheer  us  forward,  a  sympathetic  heart  to  beat 
with  ours  in  our  agony.  Who  can  doubt  that 
death  at  the  stake  was  easier  for  Ridley  and 
Latimer  because  they  could  die  together,  call- 
ing to  each  other  till  the  leaping  flames  choked 
them?     Whereas  the  real  pathfinder  must  ac- 


14  CROSS-LOTS 

cept  loneliness  bleak  and  utter.  Such  is  the 
great  lesson  which  John  Drinkwater  teaches 
in  his  Abraham  Lincoln.  From  the  prologue 
to  the  falling  of  the  curtain  over  the  closing 
scene,  the  audience  feels  the  chill  of  the  Great 
Commoner's  loneliness.  Even  in  company  he 
seemed  to  be  walking  alone — with  his  mighty 
dream  and  his  unshakable  resolve.  In  his 
home,  in  the  Cabinet  chamber,  at  Grant's 
headquarters — always  the  chill  of  isolation. 
Great,  gaunt,  tragic  figure,  with  a  heart  so 
understanding  and  tender  as  to  offer  hos- 
pitality to  a  world,  and  to  stretch  out  a  for- 
giving hand  to  his  foes,  earth  has  rarely  matched 
him  for  loneliness  since  Jesus  "trod  the  wine- 
press alone."  Such,  in  maximum  measure,  is 
the  price  of  being  a  pioneer. 

But  I  have  not  lost  sight  of  my  cross-lots 
path,  nor  intended  to  read  into  it  more  than 
is  implicitly  there.  I  do  not  suppose  that  the 
cross-lots  pilgrim  who  blazed  the  trail  I  fol- 
lowed that  midsummer  day  was  consciously 
making  a  path  for  his  successors.  His  choice 
was  primarily  an  individual  matter.  He  was 
suiting  his  own  convenience  or  pleasure.  He 
was  thinking  and  deciding  in  personal  terms. 
Exactly.  And  why  shrink  from  the  logic  of 
that?  Until  one  identifies  with  his  own  felicity 
the  needs  of  others;  until  their  cries  ring  in  his 


THE  CROSS-LOTS  PATH  15 

own  soul  and  he  makes  their  cause  his  own, 
he   will   rarely   leave  the  beaten  path.     The 
world  has  had  plenty  of  easy-chair  reformers 
whose  program  was  exceedingly  beautiful  but 
who  evinced  no  readiness  to  sweat  blood  for 
the  sake  of  its  adoption  on  earth.     Always 
there  has  been  a  plethora  of  academic  wisdom 
— for  use  by  others.    Theoretically,  Oliver  Wen- 
dell Holmes  was  as  convinced  a  protagonist 
of  human  rights  as  William  Lloyd   Garrison 
was.     But  the  fire  never  blazed  in  the  "genial 
autocrat's"  soul.    He  was  unwilling  to  disturb 
roughly  or  to  be  unpleasantly  disturbed.    When 
Germany  decided  to  treat  as  a  mere  scrap  of 
paper  her  solemn  obligation  toward  Belgium, 
multitudes  saw  our  duty  as  clearly  as  Theodore 
Roosevelt  did.     But  they  failed  to  make  it 
their  own.     As  one  well  expressed  the  thing 
for  them,  they  were  not  personally  concerned 
with  the  squabbles  of  Europe.     Their  hearts 
did  not  bleed  with  stricken  France.    Not  until 
the  fire  that  was  sweeping  Europe  got  into 
our  own  bones  did  we  make  her  cause  ours, 
her  anguish  our  own. 

I  do  not  think  we  have  understood  the 
Imprecatory  Psalms.  At  least  we  have  failed 
to  realize  that  there  are  two  ways  of  viewing 
them.  In  one  aspect,  David  was  altogether 
too  quick  to  confuse  his  personal  miseries  with 


16  CROSS-LOTS 

the  case  of  his  people.  He  seems  to  have  felt 
that,  because  he  had  been  maHgned  and  mal- 
treated, an  insult  which  Jehovah  was  bound 
to  avenge  had  been  offered  to  his  Kingdom. 
To  such  lengths  we  cannot  go  with  him.  On 
the  other  hand,  it  is  only  when  such  an  one 
as  David  feels,  as  personal,  the  woes  and  hurts 
of  his  people,  that  he  will  be  apt  to  stir  him- 
self in  their  behalf.  "I  cannot  bear  to  leave 
the  world  with  so  much  sin  and  misery  in  it," 
lamented  one  of  England's  rarest  spirits.  He 
had  made  common  cause  with  the  poor  and 
benighted.  What  they  suffered  wrung  him. 
Their  shames  seemed  to  attach  to  him.  Be- 
cause they  were  dying  unshriven  he  was 
afraid  to  die — as  if  their  sin  were  his.  He 
was  pleading  for  his  own  soul  when  he  cried 
out  on  behalf  of  theirs.  Livingstone's  challenge 
for  help  to  heal  the  open  sore  of  the  world 
was  a  great  protest  in  his  own  name.  He 
had  lived  so  long  and  so  sympathetically  with 
Africa  that  her  malady  had,  so  to  speak,  been 
contracted  by  him.  At  least  he  felt  her  scourge 
as  a  personal  aflfliction.  The  chastisement  of 
her  peace  was  upon  him,  and  with  his  stripes 
only — and  others  like  his — could  she  be  healed. 
Much  has  been  made  of  the  recent  instance 
of  a  young  American  renouncing,  for  sociolog- 
ical reasons,  a  million-dollar  inheritance.     He 


THE  CROSS-LOTS  PATH  17 

has  been  belabored  and  praised  extravagantly. 
He  has  been  called  both  fool  and  prophet. 
Whether  his  act  was  well  calculated  to  help 
bring  in  the  new  day  of  industrial  democracy 
may  be  left  to  him  and  his  Maker.  But  this, 
at  least,  is  clear:  only  by  a  personal  identifica- 
tion of  industrial  maladies  with  one's  own  life; 
only  as  the  real  inequities  and  cruelties  of  in- 
dustrial feudalism  bite  into  the  souls  of  such 
men  as  Kingsley  and  Maurice,  as  Bright  and 
Roosevelt,  will  the  better  day  be  hastened. 
Granted  all  the  chicaneries  and  overreaching 
demagoguery  of  labor,  its  defiances  and  its 
savageries,  the  fact  remains  that,  mostly,  the 
shoe  has  been  on  the  other  foot.  And  the 
employing  class  must  feel  the  pinch  of  that 
shoe,  must  elect  to  feel  it  vicariously,  or,  by 
superior  brute  strength,  they  may  be  forced 
to  wear  it.  The  world  waits  feverishly  for 
pioneers  in  that  shining  path — cross-lots. 

Likely  I  may  seem  to  have  stressed  unduly 
the  advantages  of  the  short-cut  in  life.  True 
enough,  the  shortened  way  is  not  necessarily 
the  best.  Concerning  a  certain  forty-year 
pilgrimage  which  might  have  been  made  in 
less  than  that  number  of  days,  the  record  is 
that  "God  led  them  not  through  the  land  of 
the  Philistines,  though  that  was  near."  And, 
as  supplying  the  reason,  an  astute  interpreter 


18  CROSS-LOTS 

observes:  "It  needed  only  forty  days  to  get 
Israel  out  of  Egypt,  but  it  took  forty  years 
to  get  Egypt  out  of  Israel."  Always  there  is 
the  education  of  the  pilgrim  to  be  reckoned 
with.  And  the  long,  long  trail  that  develops 
the  man,  en  route,  is  better  than  the  short 
route  that  delivers  him  at  his  destination, 
raw  and  undiscipHned.  Thus  the  "longest 
way  round"  may  be  the  "shortest  way  home," 
not  for  lovers  only  but  for  pilgrims  with  les- 
sons to  master  on  the  journey.  Indeed,  the 
road  itself,  for  many  rich  ends  in  life,  may  be 
as  important  as  the  destination.  "Happy  the 
frost  which  saves  the  artist  by  blighting  his 
premature  success."  Or,  as  some  one  sings 
the  truth  of  it: — 

"When  the  rough  ways  oppose. 

When  the  hard  means  rebel. 
Fairer  the  work  outgrows. 

More  p)otent  far  the  spell." 

But,  ordinarily,  the  short-cut  is  an  achieve- 
ment worthy  of  genius  at  its  best.  One  may 
fairly  accurately  measure  the  world's  progress 
by  its  discovery  and  use  of  such  cross-lots 
paths.  If  to  make  two  blades  of  grass  grow 
where  one  grew  before  constitutes  a  benefac- 
tion, why  not  the  shortening  of  a  weary  process? 
Columbus  was  questing  a  short  route  to  the 
East  Indies  when  he  stumbled,  so  to  speak. 


THE  CROSS-LOTS  PATH  19 

upon  a  new  continent  of  wealth  and  wonder. 
Stephenson  with  his  locomotive  helped  make 
neighbors  of  men  everywhere,  as  did  Fulton 
with  his  Clermont.  Morse  virtually  anni- 
hilated distance  by  his  invention.  And  Marconi 
opened  another  and  still  shorter  path  in  the 
same  direction.  Printing  press,  cotton  gin, 
sewing  machine,  telephone,  Diesel  engine  are 
merely  items  from  a  tediously  long  and  yet 
brilliant  list  of  familiar  short-cuts.  Lord  Lister 
abridged  the  tedium  of  many  a  convalescence. 
In  every  laboratory  are  contrivances  that  ac- 
complish, in  a  few  hurrying  minutes,  results 
that  once  required  hours.  Word  has  been 
passed  around  that  even  a  bone  may  be  forced 
to  knit  in  less  than  the  traditional  term. 
Everywhere  the  same  marvelous  phenomenon 
— distances  shortened,  processes  simplified,  life's 
strain  eased.  Indeed,  folks  have  become  so 
accustomed  to  such  surprises  that  even  sedate 
ones  were  ready  to  accept  Ponzi's  absurd 
pledges  of  fabulous  dividends  on  their  money. 
I  heard  a  keen  young  merchant  calmly  argue 
all  the  incredibility  out  of  the  performance — 
so  used  are  we  to  seeing  the  impossible  achieved. 
Already  we  have  lived  to  behold  an  ancient 
prophecy  fulfilled,  of  a  "nation  born  in  a  day." 
With  such  a  history,  who  shall  dare  fix  limits 
to  the  achievements  of  the  next  hundred  years? 


20  CROSS-LOTS 

With  the  wizardry  of  Burbank  as  a  hint  of 
cross-lots  paths  in  nature,  he  would  be  fool- 
hardy who  should  even  guess  the  shortening 
of  the  world's  travail  in  the  realm  of  spirit. 

One  day,  long  ago,  a  Man  in  whose  arms 
little  children  nestled  happily,  and  in  the 
shadow  of  whose  understanding  heart  fevered 
souls  found  their  pulses  quieting,  looked  out 
across  a  Judsean  meadow,  and  said:  "Ye  say, 
yet  four  months  and  then  cometh  harvest. 
But  I  say  unto  you,  lift  up  your  eyes  and 
behold  the  fields  ah-eady  white  unto  harvest." 
I  do  not  understand  him  as  denying  the  law 
of  ordinary  harvest,  but  as  declaring  the  opera- 
tion also  of  a  still  higher  law.  Science  would 
probably  call  it  "the  law  of  the  sudden  leap." 
Religion  calls  it  redemption.  The  Man  I  am 
thinking  of  shortened  the  process.  Whereas, 
before,  men  had  expected  to  groan  their  way 
toward  it,  with  flagellations,  fastings,  and 
horrors  of  doubt,  he  gave  them  the  cross-lots 
path,  fringed  with  green  and  spattered  with 
blossoms.  That  accounts  for  the  gladness  of 
his  message.  To  weary,  baffled  folks,  footsore 
with  a  long  quest  of  peace  and  stung  with  a 
hundred  futilities,  he  showed  the  short  path 
that  leads  home.  Nay,  he  said,  "Foflow  me." 
And  his  feet  were  scarred  with  the  path  he 
made  for  us  while  he  opened  the  trail. 


II 

TAKEN  FOR  GRANTED 

It  was  late — absurdly  so  perhaps.  But  one 
misses  a  great  deal  if  he  always  keeps  good 
hours.  Eight  hours  out  of  the  scampering 
twenty-four  seem  an  unfair  ratio  to  spend  in 
oblivion  when  there's  so  much  to  be  seen  and 
done;  and  ten  hours  in  bed  constitute  robbery 
of  life.  I've  always  envied  Napoleon,  who, 
according  to  tradition,  could  get  on  with  four 
hours'  sleep.  However,  I'm  not  quarreling 
with  the  hygienists;  merely  expressing  a  per- 
sonal whim,  and  observing  that,  on  the  night 
in  question,  the  hour  was  late.  The  last  house- 
light  visible  to  the  passer-by  had  been  ex- 
tinguished. Every  window  on  the  block  was 
dark.  About  the  only  sound  audible  was  the 
click  of  my  own  heels  on  the  pavement. 
"Click"  is  the  word.  For  several  reasons  I 
do  not  like  rubber  heels.  Doubtless,  they  re- 
duce the  jars  of  pedestrianism,  as  the  adver- 
tisers vociferously  maintain.  But,  as  one 
offset  to  their  obvious  advantage  over  good 
leather  and  cobbler's  nails,  they  take  away 
the  company-feeling  one  has  when  he  can  hear 

21 


22  CROSS-LOTS 

his  own  progress  up  the  street  at  night.  More- 
over, they  suggest  footpads  whose  trade  thrives 
best  by  silent  approach  from  behind.  There's 
something  human,  not  to  say  humanizing, 
about  the  ring  on  the  pavement  of  old-fashioned 
heels.  Across  the  spaces  of  intervening  years 
I  still  can  hear  the  gladdening  sound  of  my 
father's  footfalls,  as  his  firm  step  neared  the 
house  and  turned  in  at  the  gate.  And  listening 
oft,  when  the  hours  were  small  and  sleep 
would  not  be  wooed,  I've  fancied  that,  by  the 
echoing  step  of  some  night-pilgrim,  I  could 
guess  his  mood  and  his  errand.  Much  that  a 
man  is  and  dreams  and  suffers  is  confessed  in 
his  gait;  and  sometimes  you  may  read  with 
your  ears  when  your  eyes  are  withheld.  Albeit, 
and  spite  of  the  physiological  desirabiHty  of 
heels  that  make  no  noise,  I  enjoy  the  sound 
of  a  sturdy  step — my  own  or  another's. 

But  this  did  not  set  out  to  be  a  homily  on 
foot-gear:  my  theme  is  milk-bottles.  Just 
outside  the  front  door  of  the  first  house  on 
the  block  I  happened  to  notice  one  of  these 
conveniences  of  the  modern  milkman;  on  the 
next  doorstep,  two  bottles;  on  a  third,  four 
bottles.  By  that  time  I  was  interested,  and  I 
watched  for  the  bottles  as  I  passed  successive 
doors.  Incidentally,  I  permitted  myseK  a 
little  romancing  as  to  the  personnel  and  taste 


TAKEN  FOR  GRANTED  23 

of  particular  households,  judging  by  the  num- 
ber of  milk-bottles  in  sight.  An  unusually 
large  collection  suggested  children  in  the  home, 
or  boarders,  or  the  visible  results  of  an  anti- 
coffee  crusade.  One  doorstep  was  bare  of 
bottles.  Had  the  householder  forgot  her  duty 
just  before  the  front  door  closed  for  the  night .'^ 
Or  used  they  condensed  milk  within.'^  None 
of  my  affair  of  course;  but  one  always  ques- 
tions the  exceptional.  When  the  milkman 
rattled  up  the  street,  next  morning,  he  would 
look  and  pass  on. 

But  what  interested  me  specially  was  not 
the  number  but  the  fact  of  milk-bottles  on  the 
steps.  Time  was — and  still  is,  in  certain  rural 
communities — when,  if  there  is  to  be  milk  in 
the  house,  somebody  must  go  after  it,  with 
bucket  or  pitcher.  Empty  milk-bottles  on  the 
steps,  waiting  to  be  replaced  by  full  bottles, 
are  plain  witness  to  what  we  call  civilization. 
They  are  but  single  instances  of  the  sometimes 
counterbalanced  advantages  of  living  in  a 
modern  age.  They  typify  the  facility  with 
which,  in  many  of  its  aspects,  modern  life  is 
lived.  AVhether  life  is  more  worthfully  lived 
under  the  variously  and  ingeniously  softened 
conditions  of  our  day;  whether,  for  every  ease- 
ment of  his  journey,  the  pilgrim  is  demanding 
more  of  himself,  in  new  and  Christed  ways,  is 


24  CROSS-LOTS 

beside  my  present  purpose.  For  the  nonce, 
and  taking  cue  from  the  quiet  milk-bottles  on 
the  steps,  I  am  merely  observing  how  much  we 
take  for  granted.  We  fall  asleep  at  night 
expecting  a  host  of  doors  to  open  automatically 
at  our  approach  next  morning.  We  wake  at 
dawn  perhaps — or  a  little  later,  by  the  grace 
of  chores  already  done  for  us — to  find  milk 
at  the  door,  and  the  newspaper  in  the  vesti- 
bule, and,  at  our  elbow,  a  telephone  offering 
audience  with  a  continent,  at  will.  In  olden 
days  there  was  comparatively  little — except 
sunrise  and  seasons  and  the  constancy  of 
mother-love — that  one  could  afford  to  take 
for  granted. 

Nor  need  one  travel  backward  a  thousand 
years  to  feel  the  bite  of  a  different  atmosphere. 
He  need  but  go  back  to  the  farm  of  fifty  years 
ago,  or  to  certain  remote  districts  of  to-day. 
All  the  water  used  on  my  grandsire's  farm 
had  to  be  pumped,  and  by  hand.  Sausage  on 
the  breakfast  table  implied  a  piggery,  and  hog- 
killing  time  in  the  autumn,  and  grandmother's 
deft  fingers  converting  to  savory  dish  the 
flanks  of  a  top-heavy  porker.  For  my  favorite 
portion  of  cottage  cheese,  cows  must  be  milked, 
and  milk  set,  and  the  old  churn  in  the  shed 
put  in  motion.  If  mail  was  to  be  had,  some- 
body must  go  to  the  post  office  for  it.     The 


TAKEN  FOR  GRANTED  25 

delicious  butternuts  in  the  garret  were  not 
bought  in  a  store;  they  were  gathered  on  the 
farm.  When  the  horse  needed  to  be  shod, 
grandfather  put  on  his  leather  apron,  and 
sometimes  let  me  work  the  bellows  while  he 
fashioned  a  shoe  and  fitted  it,  whistling  or 
humming,  the  while,  in  his  merry  way.  In 
those  simpler  days  one  had  not  as  yet  the 
advantage  of  taking  a  telephone  receiver  from 
its  hook  and  summoning  the  carpenter  or  the 
plumber.  If  the  orchard  gate  hung  awry, 
granddad  fixed  it;  if  the  rain-spout  leaked, 
granddad  played  tinner;  if  the  horse  went 
lame,  granddad  became  veterinarian.  When 
the  household  rose  in  the  morning  'twas  to 
find  little  done  save  that  which  God  had  done 
for  them. 

The  difference  between  that  more  primitive 
day  and  ours  is  typified  by  the  milk-bottle  at 
the  door.  And  the  contrast  of  spirit  is  be- 
tween a  conscious  self-reliance  and  a  dimly 
realized  dependence.  We,  of  the  later  day, 
convenienced  and  forwarded  in  almost  count- 
less ways,  seldom  pause  to  acknowledge  the 
immensity  of  our  debt  to  a  long  line  of  servitors 
and  partners,  mostly  anonymous.  We  take  for 
granted  a  host  of  advantages  unearned  by  us. 
We  do  our  work  with  tools  prepared  by  hands 
we  never  saw:    draw  dividends  of  ease  and 


26  CROSS-LOTS 

content  on  the  prodigal  investments  of  others. 
We  trade  in  coin,  already  minted,  to  purchase 
a  thousand  ready-made  and  ready-to-wear 
articles.  In  short,  we  begin  each  day's  toil 
in  diversified  debt  to  our  forbears  and  fellows. 
In  this  year  of  tercentenary  celebration, 
multitudes  who  never  before,  except  casually 
or  geographically,  spoke  the  name  of  Plymouth, 
have  made  pilgrimage  thither,  in  spirit  if  not 
by  actual  journey.  Many  the  delightful  hour 
I  have  spent  on  its  streets,  in  its  Museum,  in 
its  quaint  old  cemetery  on  Burial  Hill.  I 
have  traded  in  its  shops  and  eaten  in  its  hotel 
celebrated  by  Thoreau.  And,  like  most  other 
visitors,  I  suppose,  I  took  Plymouth  for 
granted,  historic  scenes,  conveniences,  and  all 
the  rest.  Except  in  a  listless  and  desultory 
sort  of  historic  appreciation,  I  forget  the  folk 
who  made  it  Plymouth;  particularly  the  clear- 
eyed,  oak-fibered  men  and  women  who  saw  it 
before  it  had  a  name.  When  ar  immortal 
company  of  a  hundred  and  one,  including 
children,  dropped  anchor  opposite  the  now 
famous  Rock,  little  except  the  goodness  of 
God,  and  the  strength  of  their  fellowship,  and 
the  probability  of  harvest,  was  there  to  take 
for  granted.  All  that  Plymouth  became  during 
the  next  twenty  years,  they  made  it.  Place  of 
asylum,  of  even-eyed  courts  and  tireless  indus- 


TAKEN  FOR  GRANTED  27 

try,  they  made  it  so.  Indeed,  who  shall  ven- 
ture to  appraise  the  debt  of  modern  Plymouth 
— and  for  that  matter,  of  the  American  com- 
monwealth— to  a  little  band  of  adventurers  for 
conscience's  sake,  prayed  over  by  Robinson, 
preached  to  by  Brewster,  and  marshaled  by 
Bradford?  They  teased  up  from  a  soil  none 
too  responsive  the  harvests  that  kept  them 
alive.  They  shot  the  wild  fowl  which  cen- 
tered their  first  Thanksgiving  dinner.  They 
founded  and  built  the  schools  for  their  chil- 
dren. They  spun  the  garments  they  wore, 
and  organized  the  courts  in  which  the  justice 
they  came  to  secure  should  be  administered. 
They  erected  the  church — making  it  both 
citadel  and  temple — where  their  souls  might 
keep  tryst  with  God. 

Whereas  we — for  the  most  part — do  little 
better  than  take  for  granted  crops  and  schools, 
judiciary  and  ecclesiastical  establishments,  with 
an  occasional  fling  at  our  heroic  forbears  for 
pietism  and  narrowness.  As  a  startling  eye- 
opener  I  recommend  a  tally,  for  one  day,  of 
the  multitudinous  forwardings  and  advantages, 
upon  the  uninterrupted  continuance  of  which, 
as  upon  the  recurrence  of  sunrise  and  the 
swing  of  the  planet,  we  base  our  plans  and  make 
our  appointments.  Without  owning  a  dollar's 
worth  of  their  stock  we  expect  the  train  at 


28  CROSS-LOTS 

the  station  on  time,  and  the  trolley  at  the 
street  corner,  and  the  telephone  on  the  desk. 
Lacking  the  venture  of  a  personal  hazard  or 
stir,  we  look  for  coal  in  the  cellar,  and  the 
letter  carrier,  and  on  our  breakfast  table  the 
produce  of  many  climes.  Never  having  done 
anything  for  the  law  except  to  evade  it  when 
possible,  or  to  abuse  it  when  our  personal  whim 
is  balked,  we  expect  it  to  work  automatically 
and  flawlessly  for  our  protection.  The  old 
question  of  Saint  James  stings  with  an  aug- 
mented truthfulness  of  application:  "What 
hast  thou  that  thou  didst  not  receive.'^"  Let 
pause  for  an  hour  the  vast  and  intricate  system 
of  wheels  whose  almost  incredibly  rhythmically 
timed  movement  provides  for  the  normal  on- 
going of  life,  and  we  should  stand  appalled  at 
our  helplessness  as  well  as  staggered  by  our 
debt.  A  modern  city  suddenly  deprived  of  its 
thousand  conveniences  is  only  less  incredible 
than  a  planet  on  which  the  sun  has  forgot  to 
shine — and,  superficially,  much  less  tolerable,  for 
when  the  sun  fails  to  do  its  celestial  duty  one  can 
turn  on  the  electric  lights,  but  when  the  trolley 
stops  he  must  walk  to  business,  and  when  the 
water  supply  is  cut  off  he  cannot  even  wash  his 
face.  Pardon  me:  I  am  not  suggesting  that  we 
ought  to  cease  taking  things  for  granted,  merely 
that  we  should  take  them  thus  with  a  juster  ap- 


TAKEN  FOR  GRANTED  29 

preciation  and  a  heightened  sense  of  personal 
obhgation  for  the  myriad  easements  and  the 
silent  confederates  in  a  day's  toil. 

Life  itself,  for  example.  Considering  the 
friabihty  of  the  thread,  as  known  to  all  of  us, 
it  is  rather  astounding  what  a  weight  of  hopes 
and  projects  we  hang  to  it.  Modern  physiology 
lends  startling  emphasis  to  the  ancient  ob- 
servation that  "we  are  fearfully  and  wonder- 
fully made" — quite  as  "fearfully"  as  "wonder- 
fully." The  marvel  is  that  an  organism  of 
such  infinitely  delicate  and  intricate  detail 
functions  perfectly  for  twenty-four  hours. 
When  you  see  the  vital  spark  snuffed  out  by 
a  single  breath — a  blow  on  the  head  or  a  clot 
of  blood  in  an  artery  or  a  too  hurriedly  eaten 
meal — how  ever  does  it  keep  glowing  despite 
the  wild  winds  that  smite  it  every  hour,  year 
after  year?  Yet  we  continue  to  take  it  for 
granted,  like  the  hill  against  the  horizon  or 
the  salt  of  the  sea.  God  forbid  that  we  go  to 
the  other  extreme  of  being  afraid  to  fall  asleep 
at  night,  or  of  aspersing  every  swallow  of 
water  that  is  not  certified.  That  way  lies  mad- 
ness. But  is  there  not,  somewhere  between 
the  two  extremes,  a  happy  medium  of  reverent 
regard,  and  sensitized  appreciation?  Would  it 
not  augment  the  dignity  of  an  ordinary  day 
if,  at  its  dawn,  we  paused  to  contemplate  the 


30  CROSS-LOTS 

miracle  of  breathing,  and  the  clean  felicity  of 
being  able  to  put  one  foot  before  the  other? 
No  sane  man  expects  a  microscope  to  do  the 
work  of  a  telescope,  yet  his  eye  functions  as  both 
— and  with  scant  praise  from  its  owner. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  if  baffling  fields 
of  modern  therapeutics  is  metabolism — the  hu- 
man chemistry  which  transmutes  beefsteak  and 
potatoes,  cornflakes  and  grape  juice,  into  blood 
and  brawn,  the  finger  wizardry  of  an  Ysaye 
or  the  gentle  philosophy  of  a  Matthew  Arnold. 
Needless  to  observe  that  the  field  is,  still, 
largely,  a  terra  incognita.  Indigestion,  in  its 
many  forms,  still  kills  the  zest  of  life  in  its 
victims,  and  breaks  the  peace  of  domestic 
concord,  even  explains  some  of  the  deep  rum- 
blings of  spirit  in  a  Carlyle.  Yet,  in  the  main, 
and  barring  certain  violent  reactions  due  to 
unwise  eating,  the  laboratory  within  works 
uncomplaining  and  unthanked.  With  scarcely 
an  appraising  thought,  we  take  for  granted 
its  skill  and  industry,  and  go  on  with  our 
gustatory  performances.  Frequently  it  takes  a 
fit  of  illness  to  bring  us  to  our  senses. 

Similarly  we  take  our  friends — take  them 
for  granted,  mostly.  Asked  to  give  key  to 
his  singularly  rich  and  gracious  spirit,  Charles 
Kingsley  said,  "I  had  a  friend."  The  very 
phrasing  of  his  reply  implies  loss.     I  wonder 


TAKEN  FOR  GRANTED  31 

if  it  implies  also  that  the  friend  had  to  be 
lost  before  he  was  appreciated?  (One  may  be 
glad  to  believe  otherwise  in  the  case  of  Kings- 
ley:  he  was  "different"  in  so  many  fine  ways.) 
Alas  that  such  is  the  history  of  many  a  prop- 
erty we  hold  in  the  Ufe  of  a  friend! — by  the 
pain  of  loss  we  must  be  stung  into  realization 
of  what  was  ours  without  asking  or  design. 
It  is  worse  than 

"Strange  we  never  prize  the  music 
'Till  the  sweet-voiced  bird  has  flown." 

It  is  tragic.  To  prize  the  music  only  after  its 
cadences  have  died  upon  the  air  is  to  cheat 
life  in  its  daily  ongoing.  To  take  your  friend 
for  granted — the  opulence  of  him,  the  grace 
of  him,  his  fitness  to  your  need — is  to  possess 
him  poorly,  and  to  defraud  him  in  the  bargain. 
That  smart  old  cynicism  to  the  effect  that, 
while  God  gives  us  our  relatives,  we  gain  our 
friends  in  a  very  different  fashion,  is  stupidly 
false.  If  anything  is  certain,  it  is  the  heaven- 
sent quality  in  friendship.  Friendship  is  not 
as  truly  won  as  bestowed.  I  think  one  may 
be  said  to  earn  gratitude,  approbation,  con- 
fidence. I  do  not  think  that  a  friend  ever  was 
"earned."  As  intelligently  talk  about  earning 
a  sunrise  or  a  summer  shower  or  a  tonic  breeze. 
Friendship  at  its   best   is   always  a  surprise. 


32  CROSS-LOTS 

an  act  of  grace,  a  spiritual  discovery.     Like  the 
wind,  it  "bloweth  where  it  listeth.     Thou  hear- 
est  the  sound  thereof,  but  canst  not  tell  whence 
it  cometh  or  whither  it  goeth."     So  is  friend- 
ship.    Its  largest  gain  is  an  "unearned  incre- 
ment."    It   defies   analysis   and   definition   as 
light  does.    It  is  the  cool  spring  in  the  meadow 
of  life.    It  is  the  secret  word  of  a  master-spirit. 
And  to  take  it  for  granted  is  a  species  of  suicide. 
But  my  list  of  shallow  assumptions  would 
soon  grow  too  long.     "What  do  you  make  of 
God?"  asked  a  man  of  his  seatmate  in  the  train. 
"I  do  not  make  anything  of  him,"  came  the  an- 
noyed reply.  "Whatever  and  wherever  he  is,  sup- 
posing that  he  really  is,  I  take  him  for  granted." 
Spokesman  he  for  a  huge  and  perhaps  in- 
creasing multitude.     And,  in  one  aspect,  such 
a  taking  for  granted  is  the  finest  compliment 
within  our  gift.     Had  we  to  ratiocinate  God 
before   we   could   make   use   of   him,   and   to 
climb  to  his  shining  seat  ere  he  would  visit 
ours,  we  were  in  sorry  case.    One  cannot  stop 
to  be  proving  always  the  basis  of  his  faith  in 
the   normal   ongoings   of   life.      That   God   is, 
and  that  he  is  even  better  than  a  mere  re- 
warder  of  those  who  diligently   seek   him,   is 
one  of  the  axioms  at  the  beginning  of  the  book 
of  wisdom.     You  don't  wait  to  prove  that  a 
straight  line  is  the  shortest  distance  between 


TAKEN  FOR  GRANTED  33 

two  given  points;  or  that  the  whole  is  equal 
to  the  sum  of  its  parts.  You  accept  these 
dicta  and  go  on  with  the  problem.  Unless  you 
assume  God,  you  do  not  get  anywhere  with 
the  problem  of  pain  and  love  and  destiny. 
Whatever  solutions  there  are  for  the  "riddle  of 
the  universe"  begin  with  God  as  a  thesis. 

But  I  am  not  thinking  of  that  wise  kind  of 
taking  God  for  granted.  I  am  thinking  of  the 
dull,  listless  assumption  that,  whatever  God  is 
in  largess,  in  patience,  in  ceaseless  adaptiveness 
to  human  need,  in  the  far  reaches  of  redemp- 
tion he  will  doubtless  continue  to  be  without 
our  stir.  And  so  we  close  against  ourselves 
and  in  our  own  faces,  the  door  to  the  "Ivory 
Palaces  of  the  King."  So,  we  rob  life  of  its 
deepest  zest,  its  majesties  of  strength.  We 
go  lonesome  and  homesick  for  sense  of  the 
Great  Companion.  In  this  highest  sense  God 
is  not  to  be  taken  for  granted  at  all,  but  expe- 
rienced like  sunshine  and  music  and  love. 
Said  James  Russell  Lowell,  once,  "I  have 
learned  to  take  great  pleasure  in  God."  And, 
he  added  that,  on  the  basis  of  that  knowledge, 
he  had  quit  trying  to  play  Atlas.  Take  for 
granted  anything  but  God,  who  maketh  the 
mornings  and  evenings  to  rejoice  together, 
who  gives  the  breath  we  breathe,  and  equips 
our  neighbor  to  be  our  friend. 


m 

SIX  CENTS'  WORTH  OF  PARADISE 

You  might  not  believe  that  even  an  infin- 
itesimal fraction  of  paradise  could  be  got  for 
six  cents.  Nor  could  it — for  some  folks.  For 
some  folks  not  even  a  gleam  of  the  walls  or 
a  strain  of  the  trumpets  of  paradise  could  be 
had  for  six  millions  of  dollars,  or  for  any  other 
price  within  their  power  to  pay.  The  fault, 
however,  is  not  with  paradise,  nor  the  pur- 
chasing power  of  six  cents  or  six  millions,  but 
with  the  purchaser.  He  is  too  dignified,  too 
placid  with  ennui,  too  surfeited  already  with 
many  sweets.  He  has  lost  that  appetite  which 
honors  the  homeliest  dish.  To  twist  the  lan- 
guage of  an  old  couplet,  'Wo  prospect  pleases 
and  every  man  is  vile."  For  such  there  is  no 
paradise  either  on  earth  or  among  the  stars. 
Their  breath  would  spoil  the  atmosphere  if 
they  came  thither. 

Nevertheless,  I  still  maintain  that  a  tiny 
fraction,  at  least,  of  real  paradise  can  be  got 
for  six  cents.  I  have  seen  the  transaction 
completed.  I  saw  it  fantastically  done  on  a 
thoroughfare  recently.     The  celebrant  was  of 

84 


SIX  CENTS'  WORTH  OF  PARADISE     35 

dusky  race  and  perhaps  fifteen  years.  Her 
antics  arrested  my  eye.  At  first  I  thought 
she  was  lame,  but  a  moment's  observation 
assured  me  that  she  had  full  use  of  both  feet. 
She  twisted  them  grotesquely  at  the  ankles, 
then  shuffled  them  lazily.  Later,  her  evo- 
lutions combined  a  sort  of  cake-walk  and 
pirouette.  Suddenly  she  swung  round,  re- 
vealing her  face.  It  was  aflame,  if  a  dusky 
face  may  be  said  to  flame.  She  held  in  one 
hand  an  ice-cream  cone,  costing  six  cents, 
probably,  which  she  alternately  dabbed  at 
with  her  lips  and  held  aloft  as  a  horn  of  plenty. 
For  her  the  rest  of  the  world  was  nonexistent. 
She  neither  knew  nor  cared  that  anybody 
watched.  She  was  in  paradise  for  a  moment, 
or  until  the  cone  was  consumed  and  the  memory 
of  it  faded.  The  whole  performance  was  more 
dramatic  than  one  usually  pays  to  see  on  the 
stage.  In  a  little  while  she  would  be  back 
on  solid  earth,  in  kitchen  or  shop  or  hovel. 
But,  for  the  nonce,  she  was  tasting  ambrosia 
and  lifted  on  wings  as  eagles — happy,  care- 
free child  of  a  child  race — enjoying  paradise 
for  the  trifling  sum  of  six  cents. 

Of  course  there  are  all  sorts  of  countervailing 

considerations  to  be  taken  into  account;  but 

that    ecstatic    colored    lass    taught    me    this 

Jesson,  that  the  man  or  woman  who  has  lost 


36  CROSS-LOTS 

the  genius  of  momentary  excursions  into  para- 
dise for  a  very  small  admission  fee  is  hope- 
lessly stale.  Time  was  when  a  lollipop  or 
paper  doll  or  new  balloon  set  us  oblivious  to 
the  frets  and  sorrows  of  the  world — at  least 
until  the  lollipop  was  dissolved  or  the  paper 
doll  crumpled  or  the  toy  balloon  burst.  But 
what's  transiency  against  the  outstanding  fact 
of  reality?  The  finest  thrills  of  life  are  mo- 
mentary. The  holiest  visions  pass  with  our 
glimpses  of  them.  The  most  heavenly  sweet 
chords  are  "lost  chords,"  heard  but  once  and 
remembered  hauntingly  as  a  sort  of  gauge 
to  what  the  music  of  Elysium  must  be.  The 
glory  on  the  grass  escapes  when  the  sun  is 
high,  and  the  sublimity  of  the  sunset  fades  into 
gray  as  we  reverently  watch.  Who  was  it 
said  that  "if  the  rainbow  lasted  half  an  hour, 
nobody  would  take  the  trouble  to  go  out  doors 
for  sight  of  it"?  Did  not  Paul  himself  confess 
that  the  seventh  heaven  into  which  he  was 
caught  up  was  a  passing  experience?  Some- 
times I  think  that  one  may  measure  the 
preciousness  of  an  experience  by  its  fugitive 
quality.  The  great  hulking  objects  in  life 
stay  put  until  we  tire  of  staring  at  them, 
while  its  stunning  splendors  are  painted  like 
rainbows  on  the  mist. 

One  day  my  friend  who  had  just  ordered 


SIX  CENTS'  WORTH  OF  PARADISE     37 

lunch  for  us  at  a  modest  club,  drew  up  his 
chair  a  bit,  set  his  elbows  luxuriously  on  the 
table,  and  looked  steadily  into  my  eyes,  his 
own  blazing  the  while.  "Now  we  are  having 
a  good  time,"  he  said.  Of  course.  That  was 
what  we  went  for;  not  business  nor  discussion 
nor  condolence— just  for  a  good  time.  But 
always  there  is  danger  of  having  and  not  ad- 
mitting that  one  has  it.  Not  many  were  the 
later  occasions  that  gave  us  chance  to  sit 
down  together.  His  incandescent  life  burned 
itself  out  all  too  soon,  leaving  strange  darkness 
for  us  who  loved  him.  But  as  if  he  foreknew 
that  his  journey  would  be  short,  he  insisted 
upon  wringing  the  minutes  dry  of  all  honorable 
joy.  With  his  piercing,  observant  eyes  I  think 
he  would  have  gotten  more  paradise  out  of  a 
five-  or  seven-cent  trolley  fare  than  most  folks 
extract  from  a  hundred  gallons  of  gasoline 
burned  automobile  fashion.  W^hen  he  slipped 
away,  fighting  to  live,  under  the  warm  skies 
of  California,  his  widow  wrote  me,  as  her 
tribute:  "He  had  the  brain  of  a  man,  the 
heart  of  a  woman,  and  the  soul  of  a  little 
child."  And  in  a  way,  the  last  named  mark 
is  finest  of  the  three.  One  must  keep  the 
soul  of  a  little  child  if  he  is  to  enjoy  paradise. 

Seriously,    I    cannot    imagine    heaven    as    a 
long-drawn  ecstasy,  without  beginning  or  end 


38  CROSS-LOTS 

of  days.  If  harps  furnished  the  only  music, 
and  played  continuously,  even  the  beatified 
would  yearn  for  a  drum — or  a  javelin  such  as 
Saul  once  hurled  at  David.  (Perhaps  David 
played  too  sweetly  and  too  long.)  Only  the 
child  spirit,  the  death  of  which  spells  disaster 
in  anyone,  can  deeply  enjoy  life,  taking  its 
thrills  at  par,  answering  with  smiles  and  songs 
its  glad  voices.  The  familiar  plaint,  "Make 
me  a  child  again,  just  for  to-night,"  is  not 
more  truly  a  cry  for  old  faces  and  scenes  than 
for  the  child's  power  of  enjoyment.  Accord- 
ing to  the  teaching  of  Jesus,  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  also  is  closed  against  all  who  offer 
themselves  other  than  as  little  children.  O, 
for  the  genius  to  recognize  and  seize  every 
honorable  six  cents'  worth  of  paradise! 

I  say  "honorable,"  for  I  should  be  among 
the  last  to  intimate  that  we  are  entitled  to  all 
the  thrills  we  can  capture.  There  are  sponsors 
a-plenty  for  such  sardonic  doctrine.  A  man 
with  whose  voice  the  churches  of  his  denom- 
ination had  once  rung,  confessed  brazenly  that 
all  he  needed  was  to  be  sure  that  an  indulgence 
was  sinfully  delightful,  and  he  would  run  to 
meet  it.  Not  all  Lotharios  and  Titos,  not 
even  all  Chesterfields  and  Bradlaughs  are  as 
blatant  as  that.  They  keep  their  Bohemian 
creed  more  or  less  to  themselves,  practicing  it 


SIX  CENTS'  WORTH  OF  PARADISE     39 

when  the  eyes  of  the  world  are  averted.  But 
evidence  is  not  wanting  that  the  percentage 
of  folks  who  reckon,  in  thrills,  the  value  of 
life,  has  increased  rather  alarmingly  of  late. 
The  fault  I  would  find,  however,  with  a  thou- 
sand indulgences  is  that  they  are  not  paradisai- 
cal enough  to  be  worth  six  cents  even.  I 
mean  that  multitudes  of  people  pay  too  much 
for  their  glimpses  of  paradise.  They  pay 
honor  and  truth  and  self-respect,  assets  unre- 
deemable once  they  are  parted  with.  No  use 
to  deny  that  Tito  gets  something  in  exchange 
for  his  soul,  that  poor  Dinah  Morris  treads  the 
upper  airs  for  a  few  passionate  days,  that 
Macbeth  breathes  better  for  a  season  after 
the  murder.  Men  and  women  are  not  such  utter 
fools  as  to  relinquish  something  for  nothing. 
And  your  moralist  who  professes  inability  to 
understand  why  people  throw  themselves  away 
misses  the  point  entirely.  The  point  is  that 
they  do  not  get  a  fair  return  for  the  price 
they  pay.  'Tis  a  gold-brick  game.  All  the 
good  berries  are  at  the  top  of  the  basket. 
The  thrill  dies  away  into  a  shudder.  The 
sweetness  leaves  a  bitter  after-taste.  Byron's 
familiar  lines  of  disillusion  beg  a  question  we 
must  reckon  with  always.  His  grief  was  at 
the  perishableness  of  the  fruits  and  flowers  he 
had  grasped  in  hasty  fingers.     His  days  had 


40  CROSS-LOTS 

held  the  green  leaf;  the  fruits  and  flowers  had 
been  sweet.  This  was  his  dirge:  that  the 
green  leaf  had  turned  yellow,  and  the  fruits 
and  flowers  had  gone. 

"The  worm,  the  canker  and  the  grief. 
Are  mine  alone." 

The  difference  between  Faust's  surrender  of 
his  soul  and  Jesus's,  was  that  Faust  soon 
sickened  of  his  bargain,  while  Jesus  has  all 
the  ages  to  be  glad  in.  The  paradise  which 
heroic  sacrifice  buys  is  worth  all  that  it  costs 
— and  more. 

But  to  go  back  to  my  street  preacher,  the 
colored  lass  with  the  ice-cream  cone.  I  am 
not  disposed  to  argue  the  case,  as  to  whether 
she  could  have  gotten  more  real  paradise  by 
investing  her  six  cents  in  a  loaf  for  some  hun- 
gry neighbor,  or  by  dropping  it  in  the  mis- 
sionary mitebox.  Our  own  hearts  also  have 
their  rights.  It  is  perfectly  good  religion  as 
well  as  valid  heathen  philosophy  to  "seize 
the  day."  And  when  we  honorably  seize  it 
we  ought  to  demand  its  full  paradisaical  con- 
tent. Every  time  we  let  go,  we  ought  to 
require  six  cents'  worth  of  joy. 

In  our  innocent  divertisements,  for  instance, 
Mr.  Beecher  expressed  the  conviction  that  his 
parishioners   would   better  go  to  the  theater 


SIX  CENTS'  WORTH  OF  PARADISE     41 

than  go  home  whining  because  they  felt  they 
must  not  attend.  And  I  should  say  that,  if 
a  man  pays  good  money  for  a  theater  ticket, 
or  a  movie  show,  or  a  day's  fishing,  he  ought 
to  insist  upon  getting  what  he  pays  for.  You 
cannot  do  that  by  keeping  one  eye  on  the 
clock,  or  puzzling  over  business  problems  be- 
tween acts  or  fishbites.  If  you  cannot  go  in 
the  mood  to  claim  the  full  happiness  of  the 
occasion,  stay  at  home.  But  having  gone,  get 
all  the  paradise  of  smiles  and  relaxation  your 
admission  price  will  pay  for.  Relax.  Unbend. 
Let  yourself  go.  Forget  that  you  are  grown 
up  and  bald-headed  and  rheumatic  perhaps. 
Give  yourself  up  to  the  clean  luxury  of  having 
a  good  time  as  children  do  at  a  picnic.  There 
may  be  headache  and  heartache  to-morrow; 
but  "sufficient  unto  the  day  is  the  evil  thereof." 
Drink  your  nectar  full  strength.  When  work 
and  cares  can  spare  you  for  an  hour  or  a  day, 
insist  upon  your  money's  worth,  and  take  it 
as  your  due.  If  work  is  work,  let  play  be  play. 
I  have  been  told  repeatedly  that  I  ought  to 
like  golf.  By  which  my  counselors  evidently 
meant  that  I  ought  to  take  exercise — a  per- 
fectly self-evident  proposition.  But  as  between 
woodpile  and  rowing  and  the  golf  course,  I 
ought  to  have  the  final  word.  I  can  con- 
ceive of  an  obligation  to  'play  golf,  but  I  cannot 


42  CROSS-LOTS 

conceive  of  an  obligation  to  like  it;  more  than 
to  enjoy  olives,  or  Walt  Whitman  or  prayer 
meeting.  I  learned  to  play  golf,  and  beat  my 
teacher  at  the  game,  and  joined  a  country 
club  and  bought  a  fine  set  of  golf  sticks.  But 
I  soon  ceased  to  feel  any  call  to  punish  myself 
around  the  links  as  a  matter  of  duty.  When 
I  take  my  play,  let  me  choose  what  is  play 
for  me.  If  I  prefer  a  hike  or  a  bicycle  or  a 
carpenter's  bench  or  collecting  butterflies,  that 
is  my  affair,  so  long  as  my  recreation  is  clean 
and  not  injurious  to  others.  Let  your  play 
be  such  that  when  you  invest  money  or  time 
or  muscle  in  it,  you  extract  your  full  six  cents' 
worth  of  paradise. 

So  with  our  cameraderies.  Life,  as  Mrs. 
Barbauld  truly  tells  us,  is  lived  mostly  in  short 
measures,  and  in  short  measures  it  must  per- 
fect be,  if  at  all.  I  know  people  who  are  al- 
ways waiting  for  an  extended  time  in  which 
to  enjoy  the  heaven  of  friendship.  After  the 
season  is  over,  or  the  money-grabbing  is  past, 
they  will  give  themselves  up  to  the  felicity  of 
having  friends.  And  when  that  coveted  day 
arrives  the  comrade  has  moved  to  Chicago, 
or  is  dead,  or  your  own  lips  have  forgot  the 
language  of  affection  for  lack  of  practice. 
"The  friends  thou  hast  and  their  adoption 
tried,  grapple  them  to  thy  soul"  for  five  min- 


SIX  CENTS'  WORTH  OF  PARADISE     43 

utes  where  you  cannot  spare  a  day.  Keep 
your  eye  off  the  clock  for  four  and  a  half 
minutes  of  the  five.  Friendship  is  not  so  much 
a  matter  of  eatension  as  of  intension.  It  does 
not  take  long  to  drop  a  bucket  into  the  old 
deep  well  of  the  heart.  The  last  meeting  be- 
tween David  and  Jonathan  was  brief,  appar- 
ently. But  how  they  let  themselves  go  for 
the  privilege!  Forgot  was  war,  forgot  danger, 
forgot  rival  houses  while  they  remembered 
that  they  were  together  for  a  little  heavenly 
space.  And,  oh,  the  difference  in  the  long 
afterwhiles!  The  moments  of  Jesus  with  his 
friends  were  comparatively  few  and  often 
hurried.  But  how  he  packed  them  with  joy, 
and  made  them  memorable  for  aye!  If  you've 
but  six  minutes  for  your  friend,  get  the  full 
worth  of  the  time. 

So  with  religion,  both  in  its  devotional  and 
its  practical  aspects.  I  hold  no  brief  for  the 
"Holy  Rollers,"  or  for  the  vagaries  of  re- 
ligious ecstasies.  Too  often  the  chasm  between 
religion  and  ethics  is  unbridgeable.  But  there 
is  this  to  say;  that  the  enthusiasts  I  am  think- 
ing of  get  out  of  their  religion  (such  as  it  is) 
a  thrill  that  the  rest  of  us,  with  better  war- 
rant for  exuberance,  commonly  miss.  We  take 
our  religion  too  lugubriously.  Mostly  'tis  duty 
instead  of  delight.     We  whip  ourselves  to  the 


44  CROSS-LOTS 

altar  and  to  the  house  of  the  poor.    We  deny 
ourselves  with  a  wry  face.     Wa     Chesterton 
wrong  in  his  contention  that  we  ought  to  have 
fun  in  the  service  of  God?     "Neither  be  ye 
sorry,"   adjures  the  prophet.     If  a  redeemed 
life   is    "Paradise   Regained,"   then   we   ought 
to  be  ashamed  to  be  so  lugubrious  about  it. 
We  ought  to  get  our  sacrifice's  worth  of  para- 
dise.   Seriously,  I  fancy  that  God  would  prefer 
five  dollars  hilariously  given  than  twice  that 
amount    subscribed    with    an    inward    groan. 
Ordinarily,  I  would  recommend  a  short  prayer 
in  preference  to  a  long  one  if  so  we  could  rise 
from  our  knees  with  a  song.     No  other  thrill 
known  to  men  compares  with  the  reaction  in 
the  heart  of  a  beautiful  deed  graciously  per- 
formed, or  a  worthy  self-denial  made  in  the 
spirit  of  Christ.    Missing  the  reaction,  we  may 
justly  suspect  the  sincerity  or  singleness  of  the 
deed.     But  living  the  victorious  life,  we  may 
claim  every  tingle  of  its  fine  joy.    God  is  not  to 
blame  if  we  decline  to  let  ourselves  go  in  the 
rapture  of  our  truest  discipleship. 


IV 

THE  WHITE  SPIRE 

One  evening  I  saw  it  different.  Always  be- 
fore it  had  been  a  sort  of  village  commonplace, 
like  the  town  pump  or  the  blacksmith's  shop. 
Had  it  suddenly  disappeared,  I  should  have 
missed  it  doubtless.  But  so  long  as  it  stood 
where  it  had  always  stood,  tall,  prim,  precise, 
dignified,  ever  since  my  initial  acquaintance 
with  the  village,  it  was  without  special  sig- 
nificance or  moment  to  me.  I  mentally  allowed 
for  it  as  integral  part  of  the  tidy  little  settle- 
ment near  the  Cape.  I  cannot  now  recall  that 
ever  I  had  looked  for  it,  as  sometimes  one 
yearns  and  strains — and  prays — toward  a  sun- 
set, or  a  dear,  familiar  door,  or  a  face.  Parson 
though  I  happen  to  be,  that  white  spire  was 
merely  that,  no  more.  None  of  my  friends 
had  passed  in,  beneath  it,  questing  God  and 
his  forgiveness.  None  of  my  loved  and  lost 
slept  in  its  shadows,  in  the  churchyard.  Had 
I  been  asked,  I  might  have  averred  that  I 
knew  almost  precisely  how  the  building  looked 
inside,  as  I  knew  its  exterior  aspect.  Typical 
New   England   meetinghouse,   it   had   all   the 

45 


46  CROSS-LOTS 

family  characteristics;  nothing  individuating, 
nothing  arresting,  nothing  queer,  even — which  is 
one  reason,  I  suppose,  for  my  failure  to  do  more 
than  merely  localize  it. 

Thus,  indeed,  we  travel  up  and  down  the 
lanes  and  thoroughfares  of  life,  ordinarily. 
Familiarity  does  not  necessarily  breed  con- 
tempt; sometimes  it  genders  that  which,  in 
its  way,  is  more  benumbing  than  active  con- 
tempt is.  I  mean,  nonchalance,  listless  in- 
terest, unexpectancy.  "Having  eyes  we  see 
not"  the  dear  mysteries  of  things;  and  "having 
ears  we  hear  not"  the  deep  overtones  of  mean- 
ing in  breezes  and  laughter  of  children;  "and 
our  foolish  heart  is  darkened"  in  the  presence 
of  commonplace  joy.  Alas  and  alas!  If  his 
hearers  had  considered  the  lilies  as  Jesus  did, 
and  watched  the  sparrows  with  his  sort  of  eye, 
they  would  not  have  needed  his  admonition. 
Genius  as  Shakespeare  was,  he  never  dared, 
apparently,  to  build  a  play  about  everyday 
folks,  sweaty  and  shabby  and  tame.  Kings 
and  counts  and  court  ladies,  grandees  and  bril- 
liant clowns  and  great  scoundrels — these  parade 
across  his  pages,  with  here  and  there  a  scullion 
or  peasant  to  help  dull  the  background  for  gold 
lace  and  coronets.  It  has  been  said  that  the 
famous  bard  had  not  discovered  the  common- 
place man;  all  I  can  affirm  is  that  Shakespeare 


THE  WHITE  SPIRE  47 

dared  not  dramatize  him — and  expect  an  audi- 
ence. Burns,  Wordsworth,  Dickens  took  their 
Hterary  Hves  in  their  hands  when  they  gave  so 
conspicuous  space  to  field-mice,  to  primroses, 
to  humble  souls.  And  just  here  is  one  explana- 
tion of  the  lifted  brows  out  from  under  which 
many  of  his  contemporaries  looked  at  our 
Lord.  He  came  so  silently,  he  worked  so 
unostentatiously,  he  talked  so  simply,  and  died 
so  modestly.  If  he  had  "striven  and  cried  in 
the  streets,"  if  he  had  posed  and  strutted  and 
declaimed,  he  might  have  counted  a  hundred 
disciples  to  every  one  that  actually  followed 
him.  And  it  was  the  spire  of  one  of  the  meeting- 
houses dedicated  to  him,  I  had  passed  and 
repassed,  unheeding. 

But  one  day  it  was  altered  for  me.  I  saw 
it  from  a  new  angle.  Hitherto  I  had  caught 
sight  of  it  from  amid  familiar  surroundings,  as 
one  looks  out  at  the  stars  from  his  own  window, 
or  meets  his  friend  at  the  same  lunch  table 
where  they  have  broken  bread  together  month 
after  month.  But  the  stars  have  a  strange 
look,  seen  from  a  strange  window,  or  when 
great  sorrow  falls;  and  the  old  friend  is  new 
and  more  when  he  comes  to  you  in  your  special 
joy  or  pain.  My  mother's  Bible,  on  her  table, 
was  scarcely  an  eventful  volume  to  me  as  a 
lad.     But  that  same   worn  book  seemed   to 


48  CROSS-LOTS 

hallow  my  table  when  it  rested  there — and  she 
had  ceased  turning  its  pages.  In  cold  mathe- 
matics only  is  it  true  that  "things  equal  to 
the  same  thing  are  equal  to  each  other."  In 
life  the  case  is  startlingly  different.  The  dollar 
of  yesterday  may  be  next  to  nothing  to-day, 
and  big  as  a  thousand  to-morrow.  The  same 
word  may  fall  upon  the  same  ear  as  a  knell 
or  a  psean.  Even  our  Lord  may  be  "stumbling- 
block"  or  "the  fairest  among  ten  thousand," 
according  to  the  changed  winds  that  blow 
through  our  souls.  God  is  wrath,  and  God  is 
love — the  same  God. 

So  my  familiar  spire  was  an  altered  thing 
to  me  as  I  approached  it  over  a  strange  road. 
I  was  tired  of  the  journey,  as  is  every  way- 
farer, soon  or  late.  Winding  and  unwinding, 
like  a  ribbon  purposeless,  and  through  an  un- 
familiar district,  it  seemed  to  be  leading  no- 
whither — just  on  and  forever  on.  Then  the 
beaconing  spire  topping  the  trees,  and  my  heart 
grew  warm  again.  The  commonplace  steeple 
had  suddenly  become  a  landmark  for  me.  No 
lighthouse  ever  shed  a  more  distinct  and 
heartening  ray  for  confused  mariners  than 
did  that  quiet  spire  near  the  village  green. 
Not  for  such  ministry,  I  am  sure,  did  the 
villagers  dig  down  into  their  gunny  sacks  years 
agone.      They    were    doing    the    merely    con- 


THE  WHITE  SPIRE  49 

ventional  thing  when  they  crested  their  build- 
ing with  a  steeple.  They  would  as  soon  have 
thought  of  buying  boots  without  straps,  or  of 
planting  corn  in  November,  as  of  projecting 
an  unspired  meetinghouse.  They  were  dif- 
ferentiating it  from  the  school  or  the  town 
hall.  Inadvertently,  only,  were  they  rearing 
a  landmark  for  tired  or  uncertain  pilgrims. 

On  a  day  set  for  fishing  on  Great  South  Bay, 
my  friend,  the  skipper,  made  what  seemed  to 
me  strange  maneuvers  with  his  craft  before 
he  dropped  anchor.  He  tacked  unaccountably, 
several  times,  let  the  sails  flap  while  the  boat 
fell  astern,  again  tightened  the  sheets  and  re- 
versed the  wheel,  his  gaze  fixed  the  while  on 
some  object  on  the  distant  shore.  "Getting 
the  range,"  he  said  in  reply  to  my  query. 
"When  I  can  fetch  that  buoy,  yonder,  in  line 
with  that  little  house  on  the  shore,  we'll  be 
over  the  fishing  ground."  A  moment  later  he 
dropped  his  eyes  contentedly,  let  the  sheet- 
rope  run  free,  and  sent  the  anchor  plunging 
from  the  deck.  We  had  arrived.  Other  things 
being  equal,  piscatorial  success,  that  day,  de- 
pended upon  the  reliability  of  his  landmarks. 
If  anybody  had  moved  the  channel-marker, 
or  the  little  house  on  the  shore  had  disap- 
peared, we  might  have  cast  our  lines  in  vain. 
In  life  itself,  so  much  depends  upon  the  re- 


50  CROSS-LOTS 

liability  of  the  landmark.  We  can  better 
afford  to  forfeit  a  fortune  or  be  robbed  of  a 
good  name  than  to  lose  a  landmark  from  the 
path  we  travel.  By  landmarks  we  gauge  our 
progress,  and  change  our  course,  and  come  at 
length  to  the  Father's  house.  Sometimes  it  is 
an  old  moss-grown  watering  trough  at  the 
corners,  sometimes  a  stone  by  the  roadside, 
sometimes  the  counsel  of  a  familiar  apothegm 
or  the  light  in  the  face  of  a  friend,  sometimes 
the  qualm  of  conscience,  and  again  the  per- 
sistent cry  of  the  spirit — and  sometimes  a 
church. 

Yes,  sometimes  a  church.  Folks  who  make 
no  other  use  of  a  church  let  it  function  as  a 
landmark.  Trinity,  at  the  head  of  Wall  Street, 
frowning  or  smiling  down  that  world-famous 
canon  of  finance,  at  least  notifies  the  unchurched 
stranger  that  he  has  arrived  where  fortunes  are 
made  and  lost  in  an  hour.  Trinity,  Boston, 
calls  to  the  tourist  at  the  Hub,  that,  following 
the  particular  spoke  of  Commonwealth  Avenue, 
he  will  come  at  length  to  the  heart  of  the  city. 
And,  by  contrast,  perhaps,  some  little  white 
church  in  the  wildwood  tells  the  wayfarer 
which  way  lies  the  shrine  of  his  dreams.  But 
when  the  landmark  goes?  One  day,  up  in 
Vermont,  I  went  back  to  the  scenes  of  my 
boyhood.    Everything  almost  was  changed,  so 


THE  WHITE  SPmE  51 

altered  that  I  felt  like  a  stranger.  But  I  had 
a  candle  to  burn  in  memory  of  the  old  pasture, 
and  the  brook  that  wound  through  it,  and  the 
old  tunnellike  bridge  beneath  which  I  had  some- 
times sought  sanctuary  as  a  lad.  By  sight  of 
the  old  familiar  bridge  I  should  know  when  I  had 
arrived.  Alas,  the  bridge  also  had  gone!  And 
in  my  heart  somewhere,  deep,  I  felt  the  heat 
of  an  old  sulphurous  word  of  the  Bible: 
"Cursed  be  he  that  removeth  a  landmark  out 
of  the  way."  We  may  be  pardoned  many  a 
sacrilege  sooner  than  that.  To  destroy  or 
misplace  any  sort  of  way-mark,  whether  a  stone 
or  a  tree,  a  building  or  a  moral  convention;  to 
render  it  easier  for  a  brother  or  sister  to  miss 
the  path,  is  cruel  when  it  is  not  positively 
criminal.  And  in  these  days  of  rapid  flux  of 
population,  when  churches  move  with  the 
seething  human  tide,  I  may  be  pardoned  a 
protest  of  the  heart,  at  least,  against  the  re- 
moval of  a  church — considered  as  landmark 
only. 

But  my  white  spire  topping  the  trees  was 
more  than  landmark.  It  was  a  herald  of 
home.  With  the  appearance  of  the  tall  white 
finger,  just  ahead,  one  could  feel  his  heart 
begin  to  glow.  Not  far  from  the  spire  were 
warm  hearthstones,  and  welcoming  faces  and 
rest — not  the  rest  of  mere  surcease  from  labor, 


52  CROSS-LOTS 

but  the  rest  of  being  at  home.  Down  the 
road  that  winds  and  winds,  past  houses  out  of 
whose  windows  look  strange  faces  only,  past 
fields  whose  waving  bounty  spells  affluence  for 
others  than  the  pilgrims  of  the  road,  fare  so 
many  homeward-yearning  and  homesick  pil- 
grims. Akin  to  the  pang  of  homesickness  there 
is  no  other.  The  heart  always  has  reckoned 
with  it;  nowadays,  even  the  doctors  reckon 
with  it,  giving  it  a  distinguished  foreign  name. 
But  the  "nostalgia"  of  the  modern  soldier  in 
trench  or  camp  is  the  same  old  malady  that 
Jacob  suffered  from,  out  under  the  Syrian  stars, 
one  desolate  night,  long  ago.  And  any  object 
or  voice  that  makes  the  heart  jump  with  happi- 
ness at  the  proximity  of  home  is  serving  eternal 
purpose. 

"Needs  nourishin',"  whispered  my  waggish 
friend,  as,  dragooned  into  a  little  white  village 
church,  one  Sunday  morning,  he  observed  the 
limp,  sad  coat-tails  of  the  preacher.  I  shall 
not  recount  the  practical  outworking  of  the 
observation.  But  I  like  the  phrase:  "Needs 
nourishin* " — not  stomachs  only,  but  souls. 
Every  fine  impulse,  every  straining  ideal,  every 
homeward  cry  "needs  nourishin'."  When  a 
lad,  dear  to  me,  confessed  afterward  to  sitting 
alone  under  a  bridge,  near  the  farm,  and  cry- 
ing inwardly,  if  not  vocally,  for  home,  I  said. 


THE  WHITE  SPIRE  53 

"Thank  God."  I  would  not  cure  him  of  the 
malady,  if  I  could,  except  by  sight  and  expe- 
rience of  home.  After  a  visit  with  Carlyle 
John  Burroughs  came  back  to  America,  to 
make  this  significant  record  concerning  the 
sometimes  truculent  prophet  of  the  better  day : 
"A  kind  of  homesickness  of  the  soul  was  upon 
him,  and  it  deepened  with  age."  I  do  not  know 
that  Carlyle  would  have  named  or  admitted 
it.  He  did  not  need  to;  it  was  in  his  eye  and^ 
voice — the  insistent,  often  depleting  sigh  for 
the  end  of  the  journey  and  the  lights  in  the 
windows  of  home. 

My  white  spire  helped  to  accent  and  to 
meet  that  plea.  It  promised  that  soon  the 
wheels  might  rest  and  the  engine  cool  at  the 
home  door.  It  carried  the  sojourner's  spirit 
past  the  gravity  point  of  despair.  Often  the 
last  few  miles  of  a  journey  are  the  most  weary- 
ing of  all.  Many  a  pilgrimage,  laboriously  and 
heroically  made,  stops  tragically  just  this  side 
of  the  radii  of  the  home  lights,  like  the  miner 
who  drilled,  picked,  and  shoveled,  and  then 
gave  up  his  task  when  but  a  thin  partition  of 
rock  separated  him  from  the  realization  of  his 
dream  and  the  reward  of  his  toil.  I  believe 
that  the  crucial  point  in  the  prodigal's  return- 
ing journey  is  seldom  stressed.  In  a  way  it  is 
hidden    by    the    outrunning    welcome    of    the 


54  CROSS-LOTS 

father.  For,  "when  he  was  yet  a  great  way 
off"  (and  desperately  tu'ed  and  piteously 
ashamed)  "the  father  ran"  to  meet  him.  Did 
the  father  realize  what,  otherwise,  might  have 
happened. 5^  That  the  way  of  penitence  and 
amendment  might  have  broken  off  within  sight 
of  the  smoke  of  the  home  chimney?  Such  is 
the  pathetic  ending  of  many  a  beautiful  pur- 
pose. It  fails  for  want  of  an  inspiriting  word 
at  the  very  threshold  of  fulfillment. 

Lighthouses  are  not  set  in  midocean.  They 
are  not  needed  there,  but  near  shore  where 
rocks  lift  their  menace.  Comparatively  few 
ships  founder.  Far  greater  the  tale  of  those 
that  dash  themselves  to  pieces  where  the  sea 
floor  slopes  upward  toward  shore.  Lights  are 
lit  near  the  coast;  beacons  near  the  close  of 
the  voyage.  Perhaps  that  is  the  chief  business 
of  the  church  in  redemption.  The  purpose  of 
amendment  is  mysteriously  born — like  the 
prodigal's  in  the  far  country.  No  human 
instrumentality  had  part  in  his  redemption 
until  the  penitent  vagabond  was  nearly  home. 
Sometimes  I  think  that  God  could  dispense 
with  many  other  phases  of  our  partnership  with 
him  in  redemption,  if  he  could  be  sure  of  our 
being  on  hand  to  speak  the  bracing,  timely 
word  just  as  the  returning  wanderer's  feet  be- 
gin to  falter  within  sight  and  sound   of  the 


THE  WHITE  SPIRE  55 

Father's  house.  Of  all  this  my  white  spire  is 
both  symbol  and  earnest,  confessing  what  life 
needs  at  its  critical  moments,  and  declaring 
what,  according  to  the  example  of  its  lord, 
the  church  constantly  aims  to  do. 

But  the  spire  itself.  There  are  spireless 
churches  not  a  few;  churches  Roman  and 
Romanesque,  Byzantine,  pure  Greek,  Norman, 
and  many  another.  And,  occasionally,  a  church 
with  a  stump  of  a  steeple;  or,  rather,  a  steeple 
that  never  grew,  but  stands  half-apologetic  as 
an  unfulfilled  dream.  Not  so  among  the  white 
meetinghouses  I  speak  of.  By  all  means,  at 
whatever  other  sacrifice,  the  spire.  Strange 
paradox!  Commercially  viewed,  a  spire  is  a 
piece  of  Simon-pure  extravagance,  like  the  band 
on  a  hat  or  the  velvet  on  a  rose  petal.  The 
cost  of  the  steeple  would  have  put  cushions 
on  hard  seats,  or  a  rose  window  over  the  organ, 
or  an  organ  in  the  loft.  Yet  the  prudent  Yankee 
never  seems  to  have  considered  the  economic 
wisdom  of  such  shift  of  emphasis.  By  all 
means  the  steeple.  Is  it  a  mere  survival?  Or 
pure  tradition.'^  Or  an  expression  of  eternal 
hope.'  I  do  not  know.  But  I  am  glad  that, 
with  or  without  high  intent,  he  continued  to 
crest  with  an  upward-pointing  finger  his  place 
of  hymn  and  prayer.  I  like  the  extravagance 
of   it.     I   am   grateful   that,    notwithstanding 


56  CROSS-LOTS 

many  a  horizontal  parsimony,  he  broke  loose 
skyward  in  a  more  or  less  dehberate  and  con- 
scious assertion  of  his  kinship  with  the  im- 
mortals, his  indefeasible  rights  as  a  son  of  God. 
Doubtless  the  "groves  were  man's  first  tem- 
ples." The  strange  silences  of  the  forest,  the 
varying  voices  of  the  trees,  the  pungent  in- 
cense of  fir  and  oak,  said  to  him  things  that 
were  impossible  even  if  it  were  lawful  to  utter. 
Looking  up  at  the  stars  through  the  swaying 
treetops,  feeling  the  cool,  white  moonbeams 
play  on  his  heated  face,  watching  day  grow  in 
his  woody  fane,  he  wondered  and  wished — and 
worshiped.  And  from  giant  conifer,  perhaps, 
he  borrowed  his  idea  of  a  steeple.  He  me- 
morialized, in  his  little  white  meetinghouse,  his 
first  place  of  tryst  with  God.  Other  styles 
might  change,  but  not  the  fashion  of  that. 
And  so,  as  my  road  unwound  toward  the  as 
yet  unglimpsed  village,  the  tall  white  spire 
called  to  me,  through  the  evening  shadows, 
of  the  spirit  to  which  the  Almighty  giveth 
understanding,  and  of  the  long,  long  trail 
which,  wearily  sometimes,  and  sometimes  sud- 
denly, opens  out  into  the  sun-bathed  clearing 
by  the  Gate  to  the  Father's  house. 


WHEN  THE  WHISTLE  BLOWS 

That  is,  if  it  blows  at  all.  Nowadays  it 
does  not  blow  as  formerly.  Modern  life  is 
fretted  with  crusades.  Few  old  customs  are 
permitted  to  endure  unchallenged.  All  that  is 
necessary  is  to  launch  a  protest,  get  somebody 
to  espouse  it  "with  sound  and  fury,"  baptize 
it  with  the  romantic  name  of  crusade;  and, 
forthright,  you  shall  have  devotees  start  up 
anywhere — like  the  followers  of  Peter  the 
Hermit  or  Richard  the  Lion-Heart — all  headed 
for  the  rescue  of  a  violated  shrine.  Thus,  in 
recent  times,  we  have  seen  crusades  against 
vaccination  and  vivisection,  anti-coffee  and  anti- 
nicotine  crusades;  crusades  against  flies,  smoke- 
nuisance,  common  drinking-cup— not  to  men- 
tion sweat-shops,  child-labor  and  the  saloon — 
and  so  on  down  a  lengthy  if  interesting  list.  He 
would  be  bold  who  should  dare  prophesy  the 
next  crusade.  Upon  request  I  could  readily  name 
two  or  three  that  I  should  like  to  see  in  full  cry. 

In  such  heavily  charged  atmosphere  the 
factory  whistle  had  no  chance  of  escape. 
Campaigns   against   unnecessary   noises   never 

67 


58  CROSS-LOTS 

would  pass  by  the  whistle.  I  recall,  with  un- 
abated disgust,  the  palsying  hand  that  was 
laid  upon  the  church  bells  of  an  adopted  city 
of  mine.  'Twas  a  short,  ardent  crusade  in 
which  lovers  of  the  call  of  the  bells  fought 
hopelessly  against  the  "Big  Berthas"  of  the 
other  side.  Sentiment  usually  gets  short  shrift 
in  a  battle  with  more  practical  interests,  espe- 
cially when  the  latter  draw  ammunition  from 
the  arsenal  of  science.  Henceforth  the  bells 
must  hang  voiceless  in  their  towers,  Granted 
that  not  all  bells  are  melodious;  that  some  of 
them  ring  absurdly  early  and  others  uncon- 
scionably long,  still  I  always  resented  that  piece 
of  legislative  interference  with  my  friends  in 
the  belfrys.  For  multitudes  of  people  a  church 
bell  is  about  the  only  outward  voice  of  God. 
And,  firm  believer  as  I  am  in  all  sorts  of  hy- 
gienics, including  eight  hours'  sleep  "per  diem 
— for  others — I  cannot  admit  that  an  extra 
nap  after  sunrise  on  Sunday  morning  is  so 
important  as  a  call  to  duty  or  prayer.  Possi- 
bly it  was  the  disturbed  conscience  of  the 
protestants  that  tied  the  tongues  of  the  bells. 
Ahab  always  hates  sight  and  sound  of  Elijah, 
whether  the  prophet  be  man  or  beast  or  re- 
buking bell.  A  certain  famous  parricide  con- 
fessed that  the  innocent  birds  in  the  trees 
seemed   forever   twitting   him   for   his    crime. 


WHEN  THE  WHISTLE  BLOWS  59 

Charles  the  Ninth  of  France  saw  blood  e^'e^y- 
where  after  signing  the  order  for  the  massacre 
of  Saint  Bartholomew's  Night. 

But  I  set  out  to  write  of  whistles,  ordinary, 
steam-blown  devices  such  as  once  quite  uni- 
versally called  men  to  work,  announced  lunch 
hour,  and  told  when  the  day's  work  was  done. 
For  my  part,  I  am  the  ally  of  the  whistles. 
Notwithstanding  that  nearly  everybody  now- 
adays carries  a  watch,  and  that  an  alarm  clock 
may  be  purchased  for  two  dollars  or  less,  still, 
I  champion  the  rights  and  worthy  service  of 
the  whistle.  At  their  best,  watches  vary  as 
timepieces,  and  there  must  be  fixed  hours  to 
begin  and  quit  work.  Ths  fact  that  my  watch 
was  slow,  on  a  particular  morning,  availed  not 
to  save  me  from  being  marked  tardy  at  school. 
In  a  teeming  world,  packed  with  mutualities  of 
obligation— life  being  almost  infinitely  retic- 
ulated— no  man  can  be  full  law  to  himself. 
Even  conscience  needs  frequent  regulating. 
Fixed  standards  there  always  must  be,  however 
inelastic.  Where  men  work  together  there 
needs  be  a  set  time  to  take  up  the  tools  and 
to  lay  them  by,  a  time  to  eat  and  sleep,  and  a 
time  for  the  "making  of  the  soul."  Hence,  in 
lieu  of  a  better  call  to  privilege  and  duty  at 
the  vast  loom  of  life,  I  am  in  favor  of  the  whistle 
— or  its  equivalent. 


60  CROSS-LOTS 

I  like  it  most  in  the  morning.  Asked  what 
he  missed  most  in  his  fallen  estate,  Lucifer 
confessed  drearily:  "I  miss  most  the  sound  of 
the  [celestial]  trumpets  in  the  morning."  To 
me  there's  a  healthy  challenge  in  the  matutinal 
call  to  activity.  We  have  reversed  what  I 
believe  to  be  the  divine  sequence.  "And  the 
evening  and  the  morning  were  the  first  day," 
says  the  ancient  record.  Night  was  the  prep- 
aration: day  was  the  consummation.  Not  toil 
for  sake  of  the  rest  to  follow,  but  rest  in  order 
to  be  ready  for  the  toil  we  are  thus  qualified 
to  resume.  The  conventional  notion  of  heaven 
as  a  place  of  everlasting  and  uninterrupted 
dolce  far  niente,  following  the  moil  and  stress 
of  life,  is  misleading,  if  not  pernicious.  Nothing 
else  so  palls  upon  the  real  man  as  inaction  does. 
Even  vacation,  when  it  spells  idleness  chiefly, 
may  be  depressingly  long  at  a  week.  "If  the 
stars  did  not  move,  they  would  rot  in  the  sky." 
Nor  fares  better  the  motionless  soul  of  a  man. 
We  were  built  for  action.  Apart  from  the  need 
to  work,  life  is  perdition.  And,  ordinarily,  the 
time  to  rebegin  labor  is  when  the  whistle  blows 
in  the  morning. 

Indeed,  the  sound  of  that  morning  call  may 
serve  to  accent,  for  those  on  holiday,  the  sense 
of  release  from  toil,  as  it  sharpens  the  misery 
of  such  as  cannot  any  more  respond  to  the 


WHEN  THE  WHISTLE  BLOWS  61 

summons.  I  am  quite  familiar  with  the  usual 
arguments  for  spending  one's  vacation  far  from 
familiar  sights  and  sounds,  where  the  hammer 
of  the  woodpecker  or  the  purl  of  a  neighboring 
brook  fills  one's  waking  ears.  In  many  ways 
such  counsels  are  profitable.  Incidentally,  they 
inure  to  the  profit  of  transportation  companies 
and  such  as  take  summer  boarders.  On  the 
other  hand,  there's  a  fund  of  philosophy  in  the 
tactics  of  that  perhaps  mythical  Hibernian  who, 
being  suddenly  released  from  the  necessity  of 
early  rising  in  order  to  earn  his  day's  bread, 
engaged  a  luxurious  room  at  a  hotel,  and 
ordered  himself  called  at  five  o'clock  next 
morning  for  the  sheer  delight  of  assuring  the 
clerk  that  he  "didn't  have  to  get  up,"  and 
of  lying  abed  as  long  as  he  chose.  To  be  in 
position  to  defy  the  mandate  of  the  morning 
whistle,  to  let  it  scream  and  threaten  in  vain, 
may  best  give  to  a  particular  hearer  the  happy 
sense  of  being  master  instead  of  servant. 
Hence,  for  sake  of  the  added  felicity  it  lends 
to  rest,  as  well  as  for  the  stirring  call  it  sounds 
to  labor,  I  would  keep  the  whistles  blowing 
in  the  morning. 

Occasionally  you  will  meet  a  person  en- 
dowed with  what  musicians  describe  as  the 
faculty  of  "absolute  pitch."  Ask  such  an  one 
for  middle  C,  for  example,  and  he  can  give  it 


6^  CROSS-LOTS 

to  you.  He  is  as  accurate  as  a  tuning  fork, 
and  with  this  added  advantage,  of  being  able 
to  give  you  any  tone  in  the  scale.  I  might, 
if  I  were  disposed  to  be  captious,  inquire  if  the 
tone  he  sounds  would  be  affected  by  his  race 
and  education — there  being  several  recognized 
"pitches,"  German  being  the  lowest,  as  we 
discovered  recently  in  matters  other  than 
musical.  But  let  that  pass.  Assume,  for  sake 
of  the  argument,  that  some  folks  are  endowed 
with  a  sense  of  absolute  pitch.  The  ordinary 
citizen  is  not  so,  as  you  must  admit  if  ever 
you  have  attempted  to  join  in  a  song  for  which 
he  "raised  the  tune."  Half  an  octave  too 
high — and  the  basses  climbing  painfully  into 
the  seats  of  the  tenors;  half  an  octave  too  low 
— and  everybody  except  the  basses  floundering 
helplessly  out  of  their  musical  depth.  The 
ordinary  citizen  needs  somebody  to  start  him 
right  in  such  matters.  Probably  he  does  his 
full  duty  when  he  holds  the  pitch  as  supplied 
him 

Thus  most  of  us  need  the  whistle.  Rarely 
can  we,  by  forced  speed,  make  up  for  our 
failure  to  begin  on  time.  With  a  hundred 
fidelities  and  ministries,  as  with  multitudinous 
enterprises  for  individual  or  community  ad- 
vantage, this  is  the  only  fault  to  allege,  that 
they  started  so  late.    Not  until  a  long  desolate 


WHEN  THE  WHISTLE  BLOWS  63 

line  of  British  prisoners  had  chafed  out  their 
lives,  and  John  Howard,  their  protagonist,  had 
immured  himself  on  a  prison-ship,  that  he 
might  taste  the  horror  of  it,  did  prison-reform 
begin  in  England.  Not  until  a  land  ran  blood 
from  Harpers  Ferry  to  Appomattox  Courthouse, 
came  emancipation  here.  Not  until  it  was  all 
but  too  late  to  strike  at  all,  did  we  dehver  our 
great  blow  in  France.  Not  until  the  pleasant 
cup  had  bitten  into  myriads  of  homes,  and 
had  stung  to  death  both  prince  and  pauper 
together,  was  death  sentence  passed  upon  John 
Barleycorn.  Not,  perhaps,  until  class-con- 
sciousness and  class-greed  have  perfidiously 
shaken  every  stone  in  the  temple  of  human 
freedom  will  an  adequate  herald  of  the  new 
day  be  heard.  The  young  Prince  Bonaparte 
lost  his  life  by  taking  his  usual  ten  minutes' 
margin.  That  was  his  nickname,  "Mr.  Ten- 
minutes."  He  never  saw  the  need  of  prompti- 
tude. And  when,  one  fateful  day,  with  the 
enemy  crowding,  he  allowed  himself  the  wonted 
grace — this  time  for  breakfast — his  life  paid 
forfeit.  Thank  God,  then,  for  any  voice,  how- 
ever strident,  that  tells  us  when  it  is  time  to 
begin.  So,  I  like  the  summons  of  the  whistle 
in  the  morning. 

And  I  like  it  when  it  blows  for  surcease  from 
labor.    Ordinarily,  to  heed  the  call  away  from 


64  CROSS-LOTS 

bench  and  office  is  only  less  important  than  to 
be  on  hand  when  the  whistle  blows  for  toil. 
Ordinarily,  "taps"  are  as  imperious  a  mandate 
as  is  "reveille."  After  the  day's  work  is  done, 
the  worker  must  rest,  play,  and  sleep,  if  he 
would  be  ready  to  obey  the  whistle  next  morn- 
ing. In  my  childhood  days  there  were  folks 
who,  according  to  a  laughing  characterization, 
"did  not  know  that  the  war  was  over."  At 
the  drop  of  a  hat  they  were  ready  to  fight  it 
through  again — at  least,  verbally.  North  or 
South,  their  spirit  was  the  same.  They  could 
not  bring  themselves  to  the  point  of  discarding 
war-togs.  The  smallest  circumstance  set  them 
bellicose.  They  had  not  heard  the  whistle 
blow  when  Lee  surrendered.  And  you  shall 
find  a  kindred  spirit  among  some  solemn-faced 
toilers.  Like  a  pet  dog  of  mine,  once  at  grips 
they  do  not  know  when  to  let  go.  Having  put 
their  hand  to  the  plow  they  are  so  far  from 
the  peril  of  turning  back  they  fain  would  take  it 
to  bed  with  them.  Whereas  everybody  ought 
to  know  that  you  cannot  hold  a  man  to  maxi- 
mum tension  and  keep  him  a  man. 

In  the  unregenerate  days  of  my  banjo- 
playing  it  used  to  be  said  that  the  strings  should 
be  loosened  at  night,  that  such  a  string,  kept 
taut,  loses  strength  and  tone.  I  am  not  sure 
— about  strings.     As   I   recall,   I  snapped  as 


WHEN  THE  WHISTLE  BLOWS  65 

many  tightening  them  again  next  morning  as 
went  wrong  from  unrelieved  tension.  But 
with  respect  to  folks  the  case  is  as  plain  as  a 
pikestaff.  You  cannot  hold  folks  at  strain, 
day  and  night.  Something  will  break — cour- 
age or  ideal  or  conscience.  Always  there  must 
be  room  for  the  whole  man  to  unbend  and 
breathe.  Even  a  razor  is  said  to  regain  a  cer- 
tain balance  of  atoms  by  being  laid  aside  to 
"rest"  for  a  few  days.  The  most  unfeeling 
Prussian  commander  knew  better  than  to  hold 
his  shock-troops  to  their  racking  task  indef- 
initely. Back  from  the  line  they  must  go,  to 
regather  verve  and  dash.  Something  vital  gives 
way  in  a  man  when  working  hours  are  too  long 
protracted. 

I  am  not  prepared  to  admit  that  the  "union 
scale"  of  hours  is  valid.  It  would  appear, 
almost,  as  if,  in  the  readjustments  with  which 
we  are  threatened,  not  work  but  play  will 
get  the  emphasis  as  life's  real  vocation.  None 
the  less  must  we  admit  the  rationale  and  sanc- 
tity of  "hours  off."  All  work  and  no  play 
makes  Jack  worse  than  a  dull  boy;  it  reduces 
him  to  the  level  of  a  machine,  kills  the  song 
in  him.  And  one  of  the  ultimate  disasters  to 
manhood  is  the  death  of  the  song  in  the  heart. 
Luther,  with  his  favorite  musical  instrument 
for  avocation;  Ole  Bull,  hanging  out  over  a 


66  CROSS-LOTS 

cliff  that  he  might  catch  the  overtones  of  the 
sea;  Gladstone,  felling  trees  in  the  forest  at 
Hawarden;  Tennyson  climbing  to  the  eyrie 
of  his  summer  home  that  he  might  cool  his 
spirit  in  the  deeps  of  the  sky;  my  mother 
with  her  open  Bible  and  the  faraway,  lovely 
look  in  her  eyes,  all  knew  how  to  obey  the 
whistle  when  it  sounds  toward  evening.  Out  of 
the  mills  where  things  are  made  to  the  free 
spaces  where  souls  are  remade!  Away  from 
the  jar  and  jangle  of  the  shop,  to  the  sweet 
solitudes  of  star  and  hill,  or  the  ineffable  com- 
munion of  friend  with  friend! 

And  with  acclaim!  If  there's  a  song  for 
working  hours,  there's  another  and  different 
song  for  quitting  time.  Have  you  watched 
school  children  pour  out  of  their  building  when 
lessons  were  through  for  the  day?  Doors 
seemed  scarcely  wide  enough  to  let  the  out- 
rushing  tide  run  free.  Such  a  flood  of  boisterous 
young  life  filling  sidewalk  and  street;  and 
shouts,  hats  flung  high,  and  laughing  abandon, 
when  school  is  out.  Pardon  the  exuberance  if 
you  must — and  then  imitate  it  as  you  may, 
in  the  more  self-conscious,  awkward  fashion  of 
maturity,  when  your  own  day's  work  is  done. 
Somewhat  ails  the  pupil  who,  like  a  coil  of 
spring-steel,  released,  fails  to  let  go  with  a 
rush  and  a  whirr  at  dismissal  time.     And  a 


WHEN  THE  WHISTLE  BLOWS  67 

still  more  serious  malady  has  already  befallen 
the  grown-up  if  his  heart  does  not,  with  a 
great  leap,  answer  when  the  whistle  blows 
toward  sunset.  Alas,  that  we  take  life's  vary- 
ing gifts  so  sedately! 

But  sometimes  one  does  not  hear  the  whistle. 
Times  are  when  one  ought  not  to  hear  it.  Asked 
the  secret  of  his  wizardlike  achievements, 
Edison  replied:  'T  never  look  at  the  clock." 
Doubtful  if  he  notices  the  whistle  when  it 
announces  to  his  employees  that  they  are  ex- 
cused for  the  remainder  of  the  day.  Why  not 
admit  that  so  we  touch  the  nerve  of  difference 
between  them  and  him.f^  W^hoso  permits  any 
whistle  to  time  his  ardors  and  endeavors  will 
continue  to  be  a  servant.  From  a  distant  city, 
and  by  a  hand  to  me  dear,  comes  this  com- 
ment upon  life  in  a  great  industrial  plant. 
About  two  minutes  before  the  whistle  blows 
at  noon  most  of  the  employees  begin  to  un- 
wrap their  lunches.  And  by  the  time  that 
raucous  steam  voice  begins  to  sound  jaws  are 
already  in  action.  Exactly.  I  know  the  spirit 
and  feel  the  peril  of  it.  And  my  correspondent 
notes  the  general  disapproval  of  any  employee 
who  so  far  affronts  the  majority  as  to  work 
overtime.  Precisely.  That  is  the  benumbing, 
devitalizing  logic  of  unionism.  Inevitably  per- 
haps, but  not  less  certainly,  the  spirit  of  the 


68  CROSS-LOTS 

guild  puts  a  discount  upon  initiative.  It  for- 
bids a  man  to  do  the  best  he  is  capable  of, 
lest  it  injure  the  chances  of  the  man  who  is 
content  with  delivering  less  than  his  max- 
imum output.  Except  for  double  pay  it 
proscribes  work  beyond  whistle  time.  Whereas, 
as  every  ardent  toiler  knows,  and  all  his 
leisurely  mates  ought  to  learn,  best  work  is 
love  work,  done  con  amore.  Love  seldom 
watches  the  clock  except  in  impatience  lest 
the  time  be  too  short  for  the  task.  Love  hates 
the  rule  of  the  small  but  inexorable  hands  on 
the  dial.  Love  is  never  satisfied  until  it  has 
done  its  utmost.  Nor  then,  even.  Love  is 
the  most  exacting  master  known,  though  the 
cords  with  which  it  binds  are  silk.  Fancy 
Phidias  timing  the  passion  that  went  into  his 
marbles.  Or  Lord  Macaulay  reckoning,  in 
hours,  the  pains  he  ought  to  take  with  his 
pages.  Or  Florence  Nightingale  allowing  any 
chronometer  made  by  hands  to  say  when  she 
had  done  her  full  duty  for  wounded  men.  Or 
a  great  mother  lamenting  the  length  of  her 
vigils  and  the  cost  of  her  loving. 

What's  "time"  to  one  in  love  with  his  task 
or  his  friend.'*  Is  it  because  "God  is  love" 
that,  as  the  theologians  say,  our  category  of 
hours  and  minutes  is  nonexistent  for  him.?* 
"Leave   time   to   dogs   and    apes,"    counseled 


WHEN  THE  WHISTLE  BLOWS  69 

Browning,  "man  has  forever."  Upon  the 
rugged  coast  of  New  England,  just  where  Maine 
and  New  Hampshire  touch,  the  doorstep  of 
his  cottage  lapped  by  the  tide  or  lashed  by  the 
surf,  lived  and  died  among  his  canvases,  one  of 
America's  foremost  artists.  One  day  a  friend  of 
mine  got  past  the  portal  of  the  recluse's  home, 
and  offered  to  buy  one  of  the  pictures.  And  the 
painter  looked  as  grieved  as  if  my  friend  had 
suggested  the  purchase  of  a  child.  Not  a  can- 
vas was  yet  finished,  their  creator  protested, 
touching  some  of  them  lovingly.  When  the 
mood  seized  him,  he  wished  one  could  live  with- 
out food  and  sleep.  So  speaks  the  lover  in 
the  artist.  And  his  work  is  love-work.  He  is 
excused  when  he  heeds  not  the  whistle. 

But  there  are  whistle-calls  other  than  morn- 
ing and  evening.  Fire  in  the  neighborhood  per- 
haps— and  the  metal  voice  screaming  for  help. 
Or  the  advent  of  New  Year — and  whistles  in 
all  factories  and  down  the  bay  breaking  into 
dissonant  chorus.  Or  such  a  moment  as  that  in 
which  the  wires  flashed  word  that  the  armistice 
was  signed,  and  a  piteously  hurt  world  could 
begin  to  bind  up  its  wounds.  One  could  wish 
whistles  were  sensate,  that  they  might  ache  with 
the  pain  or  burn  with  the  gladness  of  their  mes- 
sage. And  we  whose  ears  are  besieged  by  the 
cries,  how  about  us?  Prompt  enough  to  obey  the 


70  CROSS-LOTS 

morning  challenge,  ready  to  lay  down  the  tools 
of  our  trade  at  a  dismissing  voice,  so  enamored 
of  our  task  that  we  wish  we  could  work  on — and 
on,  what  is  our  response  when  the  whistle  blows 
its  emergency  blast? 

"Oh,  we're  sunk  enough,  God  knows; 
But  not  quite  so  sunk  that  moments 
Sure  though  seldom  are  denied  us. 
When  the  Spirit's  true  endowments 
Stand  out  clearly  from  his  false  ones." 

To  hear  the  great  call  of  a  special  need  or  a 
special  privilege  is  the  crowning  mark  of  a 
man.  Most  of  us  do  fairly  well  on  the  dead 
levels  of  every  day;  that  is,  we  keep  going. 
In  the  commonplace  we  are  found  faithful — 
which  is  no  mean  triumph.  But  there  are 
great  moments  in  which  ages  culminate,  and 
doors  besieged  by  bleeding  hands,  through  im- 
patient ages,  stand  wide  at  length.  God  gave 
Savonarola  such  a  call,  and  the  monk  answered 
with  his  life.  God  sounded  such  a  challenge 
for  Lincoln,  and  his  response  is  the  glory  of  a 
race.  God  vouchsafed  to Woodrow  Wilson  a  great 
voice.  Is  it  too  soon  to  say  whether  he  obeyed  it 
or  not.^  Signs  are  not  wanting  that  the  whistles 
are  about  to  sound  for  obligations  and  oppor- 
tunities of  staggering  moment.  To  be  passive 
and  comfortable  and  complaisant  in  these  tense 
days  is  crime.    Listen!    There  goes  the  whistle! 


VI 
IN  A  LOOKING  GLASS 

Evidently,  he  enjoyed  what  he  saw.  At 
the  least  it  interested  him  intensely.  He  could 
scarcely  have  been  more  engrossed  if  he  had 
been  watching  for  his  ship  to  come  in,  or  his 
woman's  face  in  a  doorway.  At  the  moment 
of  his  entrance,  passing  as  he  did  a  convenient 
chair  to  select  a  less  accessible  seat,  I  had  not 
realized  his  intent.  But  it  soon  became  ap- 
parent that  he  chose  his  seat  for  the  view  it 
afforded — and  that  view  was  himself. 

What  a  delightful  time  he  had,  incidentally 
granting  me  another,  if  half  sardonic.  For, 
in  a  way,  I  saw  what  he  saw  and  a  trifle  more. 
I  saw  how  he  looked  when  he  looked  at  himself 
in  the  glass.  Likely  he  was  pleased  with  the 
reflected  image;  though  I  doubt  if  Phidias 
would  have  picked  him  for  a  subject,  or  Rem- 
brandt. He  was  smoking  when  the  seance 
with  himself  began.  And  he  smoked  to  the 
image  in  the  glass.  He  pursed  his  lips  till 
the  result  seemed  to  please  him;  poised  his 
cigarette  daintily  (I  suppose) ;  admired  the  way 
he  inhaled  the  pleasant  fumes,  and  then  blew 

71 


72  CROSS-LOTS 

a  cloud  of  incense  at  his  mirrored  presentment. 
He  tilted  his  head  artistically;  wiped  his  lips 
with  reflective  care;  touched  cheek  and  brow 
as  if  to  be  sure  that  the  too,  too  solid  flesh 
had  not  melted;  finally  flung  away  his  burned- 
out  cigarette  and  frankly  admired  himself — 
until  I  wished  he  would  light  another  cigarette, 
to  divide  his  attention.  And  when  I  had 
gotten  enough,  I  left  him  solemnly  engaged 
in  a  mutual  admiration  society  of  one;  and 
came  away  to  ruminate. 

As  follows — more  or  less.  Somewhat  timidly 
I  confess  to  a  growing  antipathy  for  mirrors. 
It  is  not  clear  to  me  that  the  aesthetic  service 
they  render  counterbalances  the  mischief 
wrought  by  them.  As  ornaments,  and  for  the 
harmless  optical  deceits  they  play  in  salons 
and  corridors,  not  to  speak  of  their  obviously 
utilitarian  uses,  the  case  for  them  seems  clear 
enough.  I  suppose  that,  lacking  mirrors,  the 
world  might  suffer  a  vast  increase  of  frowsy 
heads,  unshaven  cheeks  and  neck-gear  set 
awry.  And  I  doubt  not  that  tailors  and 
beauty  artists  generally  would  fight  the  aboli- 
tion of  mirrors  as  bitterly  as  any  of  them 
fought  prohibition.  But  even  that  is  not  the 
point:  the  point  is  whether  folks  get  more 
good  or  evil  from  mirrors. 

Some  one  tells  of  a  Hindoo  potentate  who. 


IN  A  LOOKING  GLASS  73 

being  shown,  through  a  microscope,  a  drop  of 
water  from  his  sacred  river,  wrathf ully  smashed 
the  revelatory  instrument.  Very  stupid,  of 
course;  but  who  has  escaped  a  similarly  mur- 
derous mood  with  respect  to  looking  glasses? 
In  Holyrood  Palace,  Scotland,  I  saw  the  old 
glass  into  which  Queen  Mary  is  said  to  have 
turned  her  witchingly  beautiful  face.  Before 
it  she  prinked,  perhaps,  the  night  Rizzio  made 
his  last  ascent  of  her  stairs.  Toward  it  she 
turned  angry  eyes  and  flushed  cheeks  at  memory 
of  Darnley.  Did  she  hate  or  love  it  the  more? 
What  part  played  it  in  the  tragedy  of  her 
stormy,  petulant  life?  "The  tragedy  of  the 
first  gray  hair,"  as  a  modern  essayist  phrases 
it,  is  a  mirror- tragedy.  Sometimes  I  think  we 
might  live  longer,  and  fight  more  courageously, 
the  while,  if  we  were  not  compelled  to  watch 
the  battle  go  against  us  in  our  own  coun- 
tenances. 

Among  the  mixed  memories  of  a  month  on 
a  hospital  cot  is  the  sight  I  got  of  a  face  hag- 
gard, enswathed,  parchment-pale.  Any  sensible 
patient  ought  to  have  turned  his  back  upon 
so  unprepossessing  an  apparition.  Yet  I 
didn't.  Despite  our  sane  resolves  and  fine 
philosophies,  gruesome  aspects  exert  a  strange 
fascination.  Usually  it  is  difficult  to  hold  one's 
eyes   averted   from  a  birthmarked   face  or  a 


74  CROSS-LOTS 

mangled  form  in  the  street.  By  as  much  as 
that  he  "came  and  looked"  at  the' wounded 
traveler  on  the  Jericho  road,  before  passing  on, 
the  Levite  was  more  like  the  rest  of  us  than 
was  the  priest  in  the  parable.  I  do  not  quite 
understand  how  the  priest  got  past  without 
pausing  to  look,  unless  his  was  that  unruffled, 
nonhuman  poise  which  maintains  itself  by 
avoiding  always  the  sight  which  disturbs.  So 
I  continued  to  cast  reproachful  if  furtive 
glances  at  the  face  in  the  mirror.  With  a 
right  good  will  I  could  have  shattered  the  un- 
flattering article  of  furniture.  Nay,  I  raged 
inwardly  at  the  patient  who  presented  to  the 
glass  such  a  subject.  And  so  I  lost  part  of 
the  courage  needed  to  play  the  game  of  getting 
well. 

But  the  man  in  the  train.  If  ever  he  reads 
this,  he  must  needs  forgive  the  liberty  taken. 
One  does  not  find,  every  day,  so  vivid  an  illus- 
tration of  the  way  all  of  us  are  tempted  to 
live  our  lives — before  the  glass,  I  mean. 
Not  a  tangible  thing  of  glass  and  quicksilver, 
but  the  mirror  of  public  opinion.  Some  folks 
never  seem  able  to  shake  themselves  clear  of 
solicitude  concerning  the  impression  they  are 
making  as  they  sip  their  tea  or  wipe  their  eyes 
or  phrase  their  vocal  prayers.  Whatever  else 
they  forget,  they  always  remember  that  they 


IN  A  LOOKING  GLASS  75 

have  a  dignity  to  support  or  a  reputation  to 
maintain.  Correct,  fastidious,  aesthetic  souls 
are  they  who  never  break  a  rule  or  shock  a 
propriety.  They  remind  me  of  the  most  won- 
derful automaton  I  ever  saw.  The  fabrica- 
tion of  it  must  have  taken  a  lifetime  almost. 
It  was  the  most  correct  imitation  of  a  human 
being  one  could  imagine.  Every  motion  obeyed 
the  rules  of  symmetry.  When  an  arm  was 
raised,  it  was  with  perfect  curves.  Had  the 
automaton  been  provided  with  articulate  utter- 
ance, you  would  have  listened  in  vain  for  an 
improper  pronoun  or  a  double  negative.  I 
suppose  it  could  have  cooed  in  love-terms  or 
raged  mechanically — like  stage  thunder  that 
always  begins  and  leaves  off  at  the  proper 
instant.  But  who  can  fancy  wishing  to  be 
loved  by  those  automatic  arms  or  prayed  for 
by  the  tinted  lips? 

Mostly,  give  me  the  men  and  women  who 
are  not  even  aware  when  they  happen  to  mix 
metaphors,  and  who  can  fracture  a  code  of 
etiquette  without  apologizing  forever.  There  is 
about  bloodheat  somewhat  that  defies  analysis. 
You  can  tell  what  is  in  cold  blood:  you  cannot 
name  all  the  elements  that  mix  in  a  pulsing 
artery.  And  it  is  red,  pounding  blood  that 
does  all  the  great  work  in  the  world,  and  com- 
passes all  beautiful  redemptions.    If  ever  man- 


76  CROSS-LOTS 

kind  had  caught  Jesus  posing  once,  it  would 
have  scorned  him  eventually.  Here  was  the 
trouble  with  the  Pharisee  out  in  front  of  the 
temple,  reciting  his  claims  to  the  homage  of 
gods  and  men.  Doubtless  he  was  all  the 
correct  things  he  said  he  was.  Doubtless  he 
lacked  all  the  patent  flaws  that  even  a  tyro 
could  pick  in  the  publican.  But  he  was  essen- 
tially manufactured,  mechanical,  sterilized  mor- 
ally. If  ever  he  had  beat  his  breast  in  peni- 
tence, like  the  publican,  the  act  would  have 
been  chiefly  an  exhibition.  And  if  he  had 
cried  for  mercy,  he  would  have  been  concerned 
with  the  religious  spectacle  he  made  in  the 
performance.  Not  by  the  skill  of  such  metic- 
ulous Churchmen  comes  in  the  New  Day. 
Their  hands  are  too  cold  to  ring  the  chimes 
of  its  morning.  Their  clock  stops  at  duty,  nor 
runs  on  to  joy.  All  the  Great-hearts  are 
warm  hearts.  As  Emerson  has  it,  "Nothing 
good  or  great  was  ever  accomplished  without 
enthusiasm."  And  the  last  consideration  with 
a  passionate  friend  or  servant  of  mankind  is 
how  his  coat  hangs  or  what  his  neighbors 
will  make  of  his  heat.  Imagine  Theodore 
Roosevelt  rehearsing  before  a  mirror  one  of 
his  torrential  invectives,  or  Abraham  Lincoln 
preening  himself  laboriously  before  he  met  his 
Cabinet  in  the  dark  days  of   1863,  or  John 


^ 


IN  A  LOOKING  GLASS  77 

Bright  asking  full  leave  for  his  defiance  of 
vested  rights,  or  John  Knox  submitting  his 
eagle  pinions  to  conventional  shears,  or  Saint 
Paul  conferring  with  flesh  and  blood  as  to  what 
sophists  and  epicures  would  think  of  his  pro- 
gram, or  Jesus  posing  the  hand  with  which 
he  broke  the  loaves,  or  cadencing  beforehand 
the  words  that  dropped  from  his  lips  on  the 
cross.  You  cannot  imagine  such  things  with- 
out negativing  the  glory  of  the  redemptions 
wrought  by  earth's  gallant,  venturing  souls. 

I  do  not  mean  to  imply  that  we  can  afford 
to  be  indifferent  to  the  impression  our  conduct 
makes,  or  the  normal  reaction,  in  contemporary 
lives,  of  our  prayer  or  industry.  So  far  as  we 
can  compass  it,  we  ought  to  take  every  honor- 
able care  that  our  good  be  not  evil  spoken  of. 
Always  it  is  worth  while  to  match  dignity  of 
language  to  dignity  of  thought,  and  grace  of 
hand  to  grace  of  spirit.  The  canvas  not  worth 
a  good  frame  is  not  much  of  a  canvas.  But 
to  spend  our  chief  concern  upon  the  container 
instead  of  the  content  is  woeful.  Shakespeare's 
famous  analogue  of  the  world  as  a  stage 
carries  a  pernicious  implication,  that  the  part 
we  play  is  for  the  sake  of  the  audience.  To  do 
one's  work  for  the  sake  of  the  work  is  nobler 
even  than  to  do  it  for  the  sake  of  God — when 
God  is  the  real  audience.    I  mean  that  courage 


78  CROSS-LOTS 

and  chivalry  as  an  expression  of  God  far 
transcend  courage  and  chivalry  displayed  for 
the  approval  of  God. 

But  my  friend  of  the  mirror;  I  wonder  what 
is  the  name  of  his  boss.  Would  he  toil  just 
as  hard  if  the  boss  never  passed  that  way? 
Is  it  wages  or  fame  that  he  craves?  One  of 
my  juvenile  friends  went  to  work  in  his  father's 
shop.  Soon  he  learned  to  make  a  certain 
kind  of  trap.  And  he  told  me  with  gusto  of 
the  specimen  trap  he  made.  It  represented 
his  best  endeavor.  And  he  said  that,  every 
time  he  saw  the  foreman  approaching,  he  set 
the  specimen  trap  in  plain  view.  That  was 
the  only  trap  he  made  for  the  foreman's  eye: 
he  scamped  the  others.  And  he  seemed  piqued 
at  the  foreman's  lack  of  interest  in  the  speci- 
men trap.  Life  is  not  dress  parade.  Life  is 
a  march,  a  campaign,  a  battle.  And  the  man 
who  funks  on  march  may  soonest  and  most 
heroically  drench  his  uniform  with  his  own 
blood.  Evidently,  we  are  still  under  the  blight 
of  an  antedUuvian  misconception  concerning 
work.  Still  we  watch  Adam  slouching  out  of 
Eden,  head  down,  teeth  set,  feet  reluctant, 
because  henceforth  he  must  work;  forgetting 
that  his  business  in  the  garden  was  to  work. 
Said  Bishop  Greer  in  burning  phrases:  "When- 
ever a  man  is  so  circumstanced  that  he  does 


IN  A  LOOKING  GLASS  79 

not  need  to  work  for  bread,  he  must  all  the 
harder  toil  for  somewhat  else  than  bread. 
Only  so  can  he  escape  the  curse  in  Hfe  and  find 
the  blessing  in  it." 

And  as  with  work,  so  with  the  play  of  sym- 
pathy. Service  is  a  stunted,  shriveled  thing 
when  it  is  rendered  for  the  sake  of  being  seen. 
Jesus  once  described  a  class  of  benefactors 
with  nothing  to  live  for — generous  men,  so 
called:  men  who  head  subscription  lists  and 
feed  the  hungry,  but  who  sound  a  trumpet 
when  they  give  their  alms.  "Verily,"  adds 
Jesus,  "they  have  their  reward."  They  had 
been  lavish  for  the  sake  of  being  "seen";  hence 
they  had  got  their  reward,  all  of  it.  I  dislike 
to  guess  how  many  philanthropic  nerves  would 
be  cut  if  our  gifts  to  the  needy  were  dissociated 
from  the  fame  of  them.  Not  mine  to  say  how 
much  more  refreshing  is  a  cup  of  cold  water 
given  in  the  name  of  a  disciple  than  for  the 
joy  of  being  caught  in  the  act.  I  am  merely 
suggesting  the  peril  of  being  a  "mirror-man." 

Grief  too  runs  all  too  easily  to  ostentation. 
"Stylish  Mourning  Apparel,"  announces  an 
enterprising  firm — as  if  any  really  broken  heart 
cared  a  fig  for  being  in  style  as  to  habiliments 
of  sorrow.  The  last  consideration  of  deep  grief 
is  the  effect  it  is  producing  upon  the  bystander. 
"When  I  mo'ns,  I  mo'ns,"  protested  a  stricken 


80  CROSS-LOTS 

sister  of  color:  black-bordered  kerchief,  black 
garments,  black-edged  stationery — not  a  single 
outward  sign  of  grief  must  be  omitted,  lest 
her  neighbors  pronounce  her  sorrow  less  than 
consuming.  Fancy  being  able  to  grade  loneli- 
ness as  half-loneliness  and  so  on.  The  moment 
I  find  a  widowed  heart  beginning  to  be  self- 
conscious  of  grief,  and  solicitous  as  to  the 
suitable  appearance  of  his  melancholy,  my  own 
heart  ceases  to  ache  for  him.  I  love  the  way 
that  old  Israelitish  king  wore  his  sackcloth. 
As  he  walked  up  and  down  the  walls  of  his 
beleaguered  city,  none  guessed  how  deeply  the 
iron  had  pierced  his  own  soul.  Not  until  one 
day,  when,  swept  by  paroxysmal  sorrow  for  his 
people,  he  rent  his  outer  garments — "And  be- 
hold he  had  sackcloth,  within,  upon  his  flesh." 
Mostly,  there  is  the  place  for  om*  mourning 
emblems.  Great  grief  has  no  more  use  for  a 
mirror  than  for  the  wailing  place  or  the  tear- 
bottle  of  the  ancients.  Grief  is  greatest  and 
noblest  in  restraint.  Then  it  is  a  sacred  thing, 
too  sacred  for  advertisement  or  exploitation. 

And  character.''  If  honesty  is  its  own  re- 
ward, it  ought  not  to  need  so  loud  applause. 
And  if  truth  and  purity  were  self-satisfying 
virtues,  if  the  beauty  of  holiness  were  equally 
beautiful  as  a  flower  that  blushes  unseen,  we 
should  live  the  same  sort  of  life  abroad  as  at 


IN  A  LOOKING  GLASS  81 

home;  in  the  dark  as  in  the  day.  Whereas, 
the  trouble  with  most  of  us  is  that  we  require 
the  constant  stimulus  of  pubheity.  If  you 
have  noticed  how  the  ordinary  man  straightens 
his  shoulders  and  steadies  his  gait  when  he 
walks  toward  a  mirror,  you  have  an  illustration 
of  the  added  dignity  our  piety  takes  on  in 
company.  I  cannot  imagine  Jesus  as  being  a 
Christian  for  the  sake  of  Peter  and  Thomas. 
For  the  full  unveiling  of  his  soul  he  sought 
the  solitude.  Only  by  surprise  did  his  friends 
catch  him  at  his  highest  reach.  O,  man  of 
the  mirror,  thou  hast  taught  me  much! 


vn 

THE  WORLD  IN  OUR  DEBT 

Estimates  vary  startlingly — all  the  way 
from  a  good  time  to  a  living.  Evidently,  the 
estimate  varies  with  the  individual.  One  of 
my  college  mates  had  it  figured  out  that  the 
world  owed  him  a  salary  of  at  least  three 
thousand  dollars  per  year.  And  Helena  Richie 
insisted  hotly  that  she  was  entitled  to  her 
precious  fling  of  reckless  happiness.  Most 
people  believe  that  the  world  owes  them  three 
score  and  ten  years,  with  health  thrown  in  to 
make  good  measure.  Few  normal  boys  would 
concede  that  they  are  collecting  more  than 
their  just  dues  when  they  replevin  against  a 
neighbor's  apple  trees  for  all  the  fruit  they 
can  eat.  Shylock's  claim  was  his  pound  of 
flesh — no  more,  and  certainly  no  less;  Faust's 
a  year  of  pleasing  himself;  Becky  Sharp's,  the 
privilege  of  shocking  her  friends.  I  suppose 
the  average  hobo  holds  the  world  chargeable 
for  a  life  of  easy  if  inelegant  leisure,  together 
with  such  sundry  emoluments  as  he  may  pick 
up  along  the  way.  And  I  have  heard  good 
women  maintain  the  inherent  right  of  every 

82 


THE  WORLD  IN  OUR  DEBT  83 

woman  to  motherhood.  'Tis  an  interesting 
code;  and  it  accounts  for  most  of  the  anomahes, 
not  to  say  moral  obHquities,  in  the  practices 
of  folks.  What  the  world  owes  may  be  col- 
lected at  the  convenience  of  the  creditor. 

But  it  was  left  to  a  street-car  advertisement 
to  set  the  thesis  in  startling  form.  "The  world 
owes  you  a  car,"  read  the  placard,  evenly; 
and  went  on  to  indicate  how  the  debt  might 
be  collected  on  an  easy-payment  plan.  As 
"ads"  go,  it  was  a  good  one;  and  as  such  things 
go,  it  kept  the  average  of  truth-telling  among 
vendors.  Despite  high-sounding  resolutions 
adopted  by  advertising  men  in  convention,  the 
idea  of  veracity  as  an  asset  in  hawking  wares 
does  not  seem  to  have  got  into  practice. 
'^Emptor  caveat"  is  almost  as  wise  counsel  to 
the  prospective  purchaser  of  to-day  as  when 
the  Latin  first  phrased  such  caution.  The 
burden  of  proof  is  usually  on  the  buyer.  Mostly 
he  discounts  by  a  fair  percentage  the  value 
of  his  purchase.  I  have  rarely  secured  a  bar- 
gain at  bargain  prices.  Yet  the  fact  is  that  if 
one  were  to  judge  by  the  display-type  benefits 
proclaimed  in  any  morning  paper,  he  might 
conclude  that  the  whole  race  of  merchants  had 
turned  philanthropists,  and  were  trying,  at  their 
own  expense,  to  enrich  the  community. 

So,  I  say,  the  particular  street-car  placard 


84  CROSS-LOTS 

referred  to  cut  as  close  to  the  line  of  truth  as 
such  enticements  are  supposed  to.  Moreover, 
the  declaration  that  "The  world  owes  you  a 
car,"  probably  chimed  pleasantly  with  a  grow- 
ing popular  conviction.  Multitudes  seem  to 
be  so  thoroughly  persuaded  of  the  world's 
debt  to  them  of  cars,  they  have  pressed  their 
claims,  even  at  the  expense  of  mortgages  on 
their  homes,  and  of  letting  the  grocer  and  doctor 
go  unpaid.  And  as  if  to  accent  sardonically 
the  thesis,  while  this  plausible  *'ad"  was  run- 
ning, automobiles  were  being  appropriated,  on 
the  public  thoroughfares  of  a  certain  city,  at 
the  rate  of  a  hundred  thousand  dollars'  worth 
per  month,  and  a  well- organized  "fence"  was 
conducting  a  lucrative  business  in  stealing  cars 
and  altering  them  for  market.  Even  boys 
seemed  to  have  caught  the  infection  in  a 
milder  form,  and  were  working  on  the  assump- 
tion that  the  world  owed  each  of  them  the 
use  of  a  car  for  a  joy  ride  occasionally. 

Mind,  I  am  not  blaming  the  epidemic  upon 
the  specious  advertiser.  He  was  merely  crys- 
tallizing, for  business  purposes,  a  popular  be- 
lief. One  might  even  venture  to  hope  that 
the  man  who  phrased  the  "ad"  got  a  fair 
reward  for  his  cleverness.  What  I  am  ques- 
tioning is  the  assumption  that  the  world  owes 
us  anything  besides  day  and  night,  and  water 


THE  WORLD  IN  OUR  DEBT  85 

to  wash  our  faces,  and  a  small  patch  of  ground 
for  our  bones  to  lie  in  when  we  are  done  using 
them.  Syllogistically  put,  the  argument  might 
run  like  this:  we  came  into  the  world  without 
personal  request  to  that  end.  Being  in  the 
world,  we  must  have  bread;  and  butter,  if 
you  please.  Therefore  the  world  owes  us  the 
bread  and  butter,  and  other  things  in  pro- 
portion. Precisely.  But  the  trouble  with  the 
argument  is  that  it  proves  too  much  or  too 
little,  according  as  you  take  it.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  the  world  of  grocers  and  butchers,  of 
clothiers  and  automobile  manufacturers,  had  as 
little  to  do  with  our  being  in  the  world  as  had 
the  angels  or  the  conjectural  inhabitants  of 
Mars.  Whatever  obligation  for  our  liveli- 
hood rests  anywhere  must  lodge  at  the  door  of 
our  parents,  who,  according  to  the  argument, 
ought  to  have  "endowed"  us,  so  to  say,  with 
more  tangible  assets  than  love  of  music  or 
ease  or  genius  for  making  out  good  cases  for 
ourselves. 

Let  the  pessimists  howl  as  they  will,  I  hold 
that  life  is  not  a  penalty  but  an  opportunity. 
WTioso  would  prefer  not  to  have  been  born  is 
at  liberty  to  cherish  his  preference.  But  his 
preference  is  not  likely  to  alter  the  fact,  more 
than  taking  thought  will  add  a  cubit  to  his 
stature  or  change  the  color  of  his  eyes  or  make 


86  CROSS-LOTS 

grapes  grow  from  thistles.  And  the  fact  is 
that,  most  obviously,  we  are  here  to  use  every 
muscle,  every  brain  cell,  every  rare  gift  of 
our  equipment.  Maltbie  Babcock  used  to  urge 
his  hearers  to  quit  talking  about  the  hving 
which  the  world  owed  them  and  stress  the  life 
they  owed  the  world.  In  that  is  the  real  direc- 
tion of  the  argument.  Backed  by  God,  our 
forebears  did  a  great  thing  for  us  when  they 
gave  us  the  power  and  place  to  dream  and  love 
and  work;  in  other  words,  when  they  gave 
us  the  birthright  of  manhood  or  womanhood. 
Upon  us  rests  the  solemn  obligation  to  make 
the  most  of  our  birthright.  Merely  to  be  in 
the  world  for  a  few  years  touched  with  sor- 
row; to  have  opportunity  to  breathe  its  October 
airs  and  smell  its  flower  beds,  to  count  its 
stars  and  hear  the  music  of  the  spheres,  to 
taste  the  inexpressible  sweetness  of  love  and 
know  Stevenson's  "happiness  of  doing  good 
work,"  this  is  privilege  beyond  words  to  de- 
clare. I  am  not  sure  but  the  angels  would  be 
glad  to  exchange  places  with  us. 

Of  course,  one  must  not  leave  out  of  reckon- 
ing the  cripples  who  never  could  play  leap- 
frog or  climb  a  mountain;  and  the  congenitally 
blind  who  never  felt  the  intoxication  of  a  sun- 
set or  a  rainbow,  and  the  hearts  whose  bread 
has  been  salted   with   tears.     Of  course  one 


THE  WORLD  IN  OUR  DEBT  87 

must  not  forget  them;  but  one  must  not  re- 
member too  bitterly  what  many  of  them  seem 
divinely  able  to  forget.  One  need  not  pity 
Milton  and  Beethoven  for  their  afflictions, 
or  Keats  and  Stevenson  for  their  frail  bodies, 
or  Paul  for  his  sore  infirmity,  or  Jesus  for  his 
crown  of  thorns.  If  Robert  Louis  Stevenson, 
in  his  long  losing  fight  for  a  chance  to  live 
three  score  and  ten,  ever  felt  sorry  for  himself, 
he  cloaked  it  in  such  whimsies  as  made  you 
feel  he  was  laughing  at  his  own  lean  face. 
He  did  more  for  Samoa  than  Samoa  did  for 
him.  He  put  it  on  the  map  of  earth's  holy 
places.  *'I've  had  such  a  good  time,"  he  said, 
reviewing  the  battle.  Think  of  him  inditing  the 
lines  of  his  Child's  Garden  of  Verse,  propped 
in  bed,  one  arm  in  a  sling,  his  eyes  savagely 
painful,  and  his  voice  so  far  gone  he  could 
scarcely  speak  without  paroxysms  of  cough- 
ing. Then  hear  him  again:  "I've  had  such  a 
good  time."  I  do  not  know  what  he  reckoned 
the  world's  debt  to  him,  but  it  is  evident  enough 
what  he  reckoned  he  owed  the  world.  And  he 
paid  it  victoriously — courage,  cheer,  reverence 
for  all  the  sweet  sanctities  of  life,  and  an  almost 
rollicking  good  humor.  John  Addington  Sy- 
monds  at  Harrow  School  was  frail  and  bit- 
terly homesick.  "I  thought  my  heart  would 
break,"  he  wrote  long  afterward,  "as  I  scrunched 


88  CROSS-LOTS 

the  muddy  gravel  beneath  the  boughs  of  the 
dripping  trees.  But  I  said  to  myself,  *I  have 
to  be  made  a  man  here!'"  So  much  he  owed 
the  world — manhood.  That  he  paid  the  debt 
royally  may  be  guessed  by  the  fact  that  the 
first  to  bring  flowers  to  his  bier  was  a  Swiss 
porter  who,  knowing  naught  of  the  litterateur's 
fame,  recognized  the  serene  manliness  of  him. 

You  shall  not  find  any  of  earth's  rare  spirits 
haggling  over  their  claim  against  the  world, 
or  scolding  like  a  fishwife  at  the  world's  de- 
fault of  payments.  What  you  do  find  is  a 
shining  admission  of  the  world's  indefeasible 
claim  upon  them,  and  a  splendid  readiness  to 
meet,  in  terms  of  courage  and  sacrificial  in- 
dustry, the  recurring  payments  on  the  debt. 
Fancy  Roosevelt  or  Lincoln,  Garibaldi  or 
Kosciusko,  Melanchthon  or  Justin  Martyr 
putting  in  a  bill  of  credit  against  his  age. 
So  would  they  overset  the  pedestals  on  which 
they  stand  in  the  esteem  of  mankind.  No, 
the  record  is  different,  and  inexpressibly  more 
precious.  Take  a  leaf  anywhere  from  the 
Book  of  the  Immortals,  and  it  tells  the  story 
of  life  poured  out  like  water  in  passionate 
eagerness  to  meet  the  world's  claim.  *T  am 
debtor,"  cried  a  converted  persecutor.  Not  a 
word  about  the  world's  obligation  to  him;  just 
a   frank   confession   of   his   obligation   to   the 


X 


THE  WORLD  IN  OUR  DEBT  89 

world.  Therein  is  the  most  convincing  proof  of 
his  conversion.  Whereas,  before,  he  had  been 
worried  lest  the  world  default  payment  to  him, 
now  his  concern  was  that,  after  having  "preached 
to  others,"  himself  might  be  a  "castaway."  And 
the  Man  from  whom  Paul  learned  his  lesson 
spent  his  strength  and  bled  himself  white  in  an 
awesome  passion  of  self-devotement. 

I  venture  to  suggest  a  few  of  the  payments 
an  average  man  ought  to  make  on  account  of 
his  debt  to  the  world.  First,  he  is  under  bond 
to  work  hard,  to  wreak  himself  into  his  day's 
stint.  Earth  has  scant  burial  place,  never 
standing-room,  for  the  idler.  "Ef  you-all  can't 
run,"  shouted  a  frightened  son  of  Ham  to  a 
couple  of  impeding  rabbits  between  the  corn- 
rows,  one  night  when  ghosts  walked,  "Ef  you-all 
can't  run,  fer  de  Lawd's  sake  git  outen  de  way 
and  gib  me  er  chance."  To  be  in  the  way  of 
earth's  enterprising  sons,  in  their  race  against 
time,  is  unfair,  at  the  least.  We  owe  the  world 
work,  good  work  at  whatever  wages,  union 
scale  or  other.  Time  was  when  a  journeyman 
bricklayer  could  lay  fifteen  hundred  bricks  per 
day.  I  suppose  he  could  still.  But  the  union 
won't  let  him.  Nowadays  four  hundred  is  the 
stint.  Nowadays  the  wage  is  everything. 
Few  are  the  workers  who  act  as  if  they  were 
in  debt  to  the  world.    But  the  obligation  re- 


90  CROSS-LOTS 

mains;  and  even  Russian  Bolshevists  are  shame- 
facedly admitting  that  their  scheme  of  things 
is  not  functioning  noiselessly.  It  cannot.  The 
whole  movement  of  creation  is  against  them. 
To  fill  every  working  day  with  clean,  con- 
scientious toil  will  not  overpay  our  account. 
"That  which  each  can  do  best,"  said  Emerson, 
"only  his  Maker  can  teach  him."  And  that 
which  each  can  do  best,  he  owes  to  his  Maker 
to  do  at  his  utmost.  Locke  and  others,  in  some 
exceedingly  readable  novels,  have  glorified  a 
sort  of  vagabondage.  But  there  is  no  real 
halo  for  idle  rich  or  idle  poor.  Even  Solomon 
in  all  his  glory  of  gilded  leisure  advised  the 
sluggard  to  go  to  the  ant  for  rebuke  and  pre- 
cept. Work  is  the  law — hand  work,  brain 
work,  work  of  heart  or  spirit — work  is  the 
inexorable  law.  Every  child  of  Adam  owes 
work  to  the  world. 

And  a  clean  life.  "Slightly  soiled,"  adver- 
tises the  merchant  as  explanation  of  his  cut 
price.  He  does  not  expect  full  price  for  much 
behandled  fabrics  or  wares.  If  you  are  will- 
ing to  have  the  bloom  worn  off  your  purchases 
by  other  hands  than  your  own,  you  can  usually 
save  money.  But  the  average  purchaser  feels 
a  bit  cheapened  himself  when  he  accepts  soiled 
goods,  however  slight  the  soiling.  Pity  that 
we  are  not  equally  exacting  in  ethics.     Pity 


THE  WORLD  IN  OUR  DEBT  91 

that  we  are  ready  to  compound  so  many 
felonies  of  the  soul  by  taking  damaged  lives 
at  full  value.  Pity  that  the  man  who  demands 
an  umblemished  golf  stick  or  traveling  bag 
apologizes  for  flaws  of  character  in  his  friend 
or  his  mate.  Pity  that  the  woman  who  buys 
her  linen  and  ribbons  immaculate  is  less  in- 
sistent in  the  choice  of  a  spouse.  Except  with 
the  credential  of  a  clean  life,  none  can  offer 
God  good  work.  Smutty  hands  leave  their 
stain  on  picture  and  poem,  on  commercial  suc- 
cess and  most  forthright  statesmanship.  Aaron 
Burr  was  able  but  not  clean.  Byron's  poetry 
is  stained  by  his  profligacy.  Wagner's  music 
shows  the  marks  of  an  incontinent  soul.  White 
robes  were  as  important  a  mark  of  identifica- 
tion as  palms  and  a  great  song,  in  the  vision 
John  saw  of  the  triumphant.  "I  will  live  a 
white  life,"  shouted  Carlyle,  "if  I  go  to  hell 
for  it,"  whereas,  nowadays,  a  saddening  throng 
of  our  brothers  and  sisters  seem  to  be  entirely 
willing  to  go  to  hell  for  the  privilege  of  living 
a  soiled  life.  Current  literature,  plays,  dress, 
speech  mournfully  confess  that  we  are  shifting 
the  emphasis  from  quality  of  life.  In  absence 
of  cleanness  of  spirit  one  cannot  make  the 
partial  payment  of  good  work.  There  needs 
come,  and  soon,  a  campaign  for  asepsis  of  soul. 
So  much  we  owe  to  the  world. 


92  CROSS-LOTS 

And  a  ready  sympathy.  I  have  grasped 
hands  that  chilled  me.  Perhaps  the  fault  was 
a  poor  circulation.  Yet  I  distrust  the  owner  of 
a  hand  that  hes  like  a  fishtail,  dead  and  clammy, 
in  your  palm.  Cleverness,  symmetry,  artistic 
molding — nothing  takes  the  place  of  the  warmth 
of  a  sympathetic  hand.  One  cannot  get  far, 
he  can  scarcely  hope  to  get  ahead  without 
arterial  currents  of  considerate  feeling.  Ours 
is  a  vast  brotherhood.  Consciously  or  not, 
we  have  been  put  under  obligation  to  a  long 
line  of  comrades,  some  in  broadcloth  and  some 
in  overalls.  Moreover,  the  riots  that  run  in 
our  own  blood,  not  to  say  the  cruelties  we  barely 
escape  practicing,  ought  to  make  us  wondrous 
kind  to  our  urdovely  fellows.  "But  for  the 
grace  of  God  there  goes  John  Bunyan,"  con- 
fessed the  Bedford  tinker  as  a  vagabond  went 
by.  "Considering  thyself,  lest  thou  also  be 
tempted,"  warned  the  tent-maker  from  Tarsus. 
To  be  a  great  brother  as  Lincoln  was,  as  John 
Bright,  as  Shaftesbury  the  Seventh  Earl,  as 
Hildebrand,  as  Jesus  par  excellence,  is  to  make 
shining  payment  on  our  debt  to  the  world. 

And  to  smile.  Never  yet  have  we  justly 
appraised  the  value  of  smiles  among  the 
world's  assets.  "Only  a  smile,"  pleads  a  hymn 
of  dubious  melody.  As  if  smiles  were  cheap. 
Sometimes,  to  smile  is  sterner  test  of  character 


THE  WORLD  IN  OUR  DEBT  98 

than  to  die.  Smiles  through  tears — was  ever 
rainbow  as  transfiguring  of  a  cloud?  Smiles 
amid  pain,  smiles  spite  of  doubts  and  fears, 
smiles  at  the  childish  vanities  and  strutting 
heroics  of  men;  smiles  of  indulgence,  smiles  of 
pity,  smiles  of  welcome  for  wayward  feet — 
God  give  us  a  new  rating  of  smiles.  The 
tradesman  who  smiles  at  me  over  the  counter 
may  cheat  me  a  little,  and  I  shall  not  be  too 
severe.  The  friend  who  smiles  his  love  into 
my  eyes  helps  me  through  the  day.  And  the 
little  child  who  looks  heaven  at  me  with  a 
radiant,  trustful  smile  may  own  me.  Doubt- 
less there  are  debts  that  can  be  paid  with 
frowning  brows  and  black  displeasure.  But 
there's  a  world-debt  that  never  begins  to  be 
liquidated  until  we  learn  the  divine  craft  of 
smiles. 

But  I  have  just  begun  to  catalogue  the  pay- 
ments we  owe  on  our  debt  to  the  world;  and 
my  essay  grows  too  long.  At  the  end  of  the 
journey,  we  owe  it  to  ourselves  as  well  as  to 
the  world  to  die  unafraid.  There  comes  be- 
fore me  the  face  of  an  aged  pilgrim  who,  by 
terror  of  dying,  had  spoiled  a  thousand  days 
of  the  journey.  Small  indispositions  threw  her 
into  convulsions  of  fear;  and  an  ordinary  cough 
sounded  like  the  Pale  Rider's  alarm  at  the 
outer  door.    What's  the  use  of  dying  a  thousand 


94  CROSS-LOTS 

deaths  preliminary  to  the  final  event?  Death 
is  not  nearly  so  fearsome  as  life:  just  a  gasp, 
or  a  few  anguishes,  and  sleep — and  morning! 
Whereas  life  is  battle  and  pain  and  problem. 
Death  is  as  normal  as  falling  asleep  at  the  end 
of  a  tiresome  day.  John  Wesley  once  observed 
that  his  people  died  well.  Why  not,  if  they 
had  lived  well.'*  From  the  red-stained  battle- 
fields of  France  came  back  a  thousand  lustrous 
chronicles  of  men  unafraid,  unashamed  at  the 
Great  Summons.  "Our  son  has  received  the 
great  promotion,"  wired  an  eminent  commander 
when  his  boy  fell  in  action.  But  why  expect 
a  soldier  to  die  so  much  better  than  a  civilian? 
If  the  former  owes  it  to  his  country  to  face 
death  as  a  man,  is  the  latter's  obligation  less? 
"She  lived  every  minute  she  lived,"  whispered 
a  friend  by  my  mother's  casket.  No  time 
squandered  in  dreading  the  turn  of  the  road. 
So  to  live  that 

"when  thy  summons  comes  to  join 
The  innumerable  caravan  .  .  . 
Thou  go  .  .  . 

Like  one  who  wraps  the  drapery  of  his  couch 
About  him,  and  lies  down  to  pleasant  dreams," 

is  the  final  payment  on  our  debt  to  the  world. 


VIII 

THE  BACK  ROAD 

I  CANNOT  now  recall  the  name  of  it,  if,  in- 
deed, I  ever  knew.  I  mean  the  proper  name 
of  it — Myrtle  Avenue,  or  Vine  Street,  or  Cot- 
tage Lane.  Somebody  referred  to  it  as  the 
"back  road";  invidiously,  no  doubt;  somebody 
who  lived  on  the  front  street  or  aspired  so  to 
do;  somebody  who  measures  residential  values 
by  the  number  of  automobiles  passing  a  cer- 
tain corner  per  hour;  somebody  who  thought 
more  of  macadam  than  of  McDougall  or  Mc- 
Intyre.  So  I  followed  directions,  and  on  the 
back  road  found  what  and  whom  I  was  seeking 
— and  a  deal  besides.  Any  ordinary  mortal, 
from  six  years  upward,  can  name  the  obvious 
advantages  of  the  front  road.  They  rarely 
need  to  be  proved,  merely  aflSrmed.  The  front 
road  has  a  fame  safe  and  serene.  Whereas  the 
back  road  has  first  to  live  down  its  name,  to  say 
nothing  more.  It  takes  time  (which,  for  most  of 
us,  is  too  scant  at  best)  and  a  trip  thither  (which 
most  of  us  usually  avoid)  and  a  harvesting  eye 
(which  is  not  yet  universally  esteemed)  to  dis- 
cover the  advantages  of  the  back  road. 

06 


96  CROSS-LOTS 

Sometimes  I  fancy  that  we  could  secure 
more  out  of  life's  comings  and  goings  if  we 
were  denied  the  dubious  blessings  of  guide- 
books and  copies  of  Who's  Who,  together  with 
all  sorts  of  advice  as  to  what  to  look  for  and 
how  to  travel  and  whom  to  esteem.  We 
should  blunder  occasionally,  of  course,  but  we 
should  also  blunder  into  some  haunts  of  un- 
assuming beauty,  and  bypaths  where  human 
excellencies  grow,  unpublished,  to  heroic  size. 
To  find  out  a  few  things  for  oneself,  whether 
in  science  or  letters,  in  art  or  life,  adds  im- 
mensely to  the  piquancy  of  living,  to  say 
nothing  of  the  enhanced  values  of  the  dis- 
coveries themselves. 

Formerly,  when  I  took  an  extended  auto- 
mobile trip,  or  even  a  hundred-mile  drive  in 
unfamiliar  neighborhoods,  I  kept  one  eye  on 
that  supposed  sine  qua  non  of  the  gas-driven 
tourist,  the  Automobile  Blue  Book.  I  thus 
knew  when  we  were  approaching  a  bridge, 
and  how  much  longer  a  stretch  of  bad  road 
would  last,  where  to  cut  the  corners,  and  a 
hundred  other  more  or  less  important  things. 
There  is  so  much  in  a  Blue  Book — and  so  much 
left  out.  And,  for  the  sake  of  becoming  ac- 
quainted with  the  left-out  features,  I  am 
willing  to  miss  part  of  the  wisdom  between  the 
covers.    Rarely  do  you  pass  up  or  down  the 


THE  BACK  ROAD  97 

back  road  if  you  follow  the  Blue  Book.  That 
volume  of  wisdom  stresses  the  short  way  or 
the  historic  way;  the  smooth  way  or  the  way 
past  the  best  hotel.  Whereas  in  certain  moods 
of  mine,  I'd  rather  miss  a  section  of  the  Lincoln 
Highway  than  to  fail  to  travel  the  little  un- 
celebrated lane  that  winds  past  the  spring, 
under  the  willows,  or  by  the  cottage  spattered 
with  climbing  roses  or  honeysuckle.  I've 
nothing  against  the  turnpike;  most  times  I 
travel  that  way.  But  whoso  would  fare 
whither  life  is  most  normally  lived,  and  altar 
fires  glow  brightest  and  prayers  are  frequent, 
must  choose  the  back  road  now  and  then. 

Most  folks  hve  on  the  back  road,  so  to  speak. 
Barring  an  occasional  town  or  village  whose 
main  street  passes  the  door  of  nearly  every 
resident,  you  will  find  more  back  roads  than 
broad  thoroughfares,  more  side  streets  than 
avenues.  The  "average  man"  whose  case  Kate 
Field  used  to  plead,  and  to  whom  Albert  Shaw 
dedicates  a  volume,  lives  on  the  back  road. 
Say  that  he  cannot  afford  to  live  anywhere 
else,  or  that  he  has  escaped  the  itch  for  having 
his  house  pointed  out  to  strangers;  explain 
the  fact  as  you  may,  the  fact  is  that  he  is 
born  and  raises  his  family  on,  and  goes  to  the 
cemetery  from,  the  back  road. 

I  was  surprised,  recently,  having  occasion  to 


98  CROSS-LOTS 

depart  from  the  highway  through  a  certain 
township,  to  find  so  many  houses  on  the  back 
road.  I  had  never  quite  credited  the  alleged 
population  of  the  township.  More  than  once  I 
had  wondered  where  lived  all  the  folks  whom 
I  saw  at  town  meeting  or  the  local  clambake. 
Now  I  had  got  my  cue — on  the  back  road. 
From  corners  and  crossroads,  away  from  the 
cry  of  the  tourist's  horn,  came  most  of  the 
votes,  and  the  strength  which  made  the  coun- 
tryside blossom  in  clover  and  grain,  and  a 
majority  of  the  boys  who  dared  death,  in 
France,  for  their  cause.  I  do  not  allege  that 
they  are  better  folks,  and  braver,  who  live  on 
the  back  road.  Such  aspersions  were  snarled, 
in  England,  a  few  years  ago.  But  among  the 
first  to  go  over  the  top  toward  the  Hun — and 
the  morning  beyond — were  the  sons  of  the 
titled.  All  I  am  saying  is  that  the  untitled 
are  in  the  huge  majority,  and  live  on  the  back 
road,  where  life  is  supposed  to  be  drab,  yet 
love  springs  as  sweet  as  in  mansions — and 
safer  perhaps;  and  real  content  has  a  fairer 
chance  to  grow  than  on  the  crowded  turnpike. 
Anyhow,  there  we  live,  most  of  us,  uncele- 
brated except  as  we  break  out  into  spectacular 
human  service  or  sin;  inconspicuous  in  the 
light  of  the  common  day. 

Such  was  my  first  surprise,  that  afternoon. 


THE  BACK  ROAD  99 

as  I  swung,  unexpectant,  into  the  back  road. 
It  was  the  surprise  of  numbers.  I  should  have 
maintained  that  I  knew  the  town  and  country- 
side, having  driven  through  it  scores  of  times 
— on  the  turnpike.  In  reahty  I  knew  very 
little  about  the  district  until  I  traveled  one 
of  its  many  back  roads. 

My  second  surprise  was  at  the  size  and 
attractiveness  of  some  of  the  dwellings.  For 
a  moment  I  wondered — stupidly,  of  course — 
why  anybody,  with  means  to  erect  so  sub- 
stantial and  modern  a  home,  should  pick  a 
site  on  the  back  road.  Then,  with  sense  of 
shame  at  my  query,  I  realized  that  the  owner 
probably  built  it,  not  to  be  pointed  out  but 
to  be  lived  in.  To  be  squalid  in  public  view 
is  a  sort  of  community  offense;  but  to  be 
squalid  at  all  is  the  real  affront.  Residence  on 
the  main  street  helps  to  keep  a  man  up  to 
his  best.  But  the  way  he  lives  when  the  crowd 
is  looking  in  some  other  direction,  tells  the  sort 
of  man  he  really  is.  And  the  son  of  God  who 
builds  always  a  yet  more  stately  mansion  for 
his  own  soul,  that  his  deepest  self  may  be 
adequately  housed,  is  the  real  man.  One  can- 
not imagine  the  "great  Mr.  Atkins,"  in  one 
of  Joseph  Lincoln's  quaint  tales  of  the  Cape 
Cod  region,  as  choosing  to  live  in  any  but  a 
pretentious   house,    with   big   iron   dogs   near 


100  CROSS-LOTS 

the  entrance,  if  possible,  and  on  the  main 
street  of  the  village,  of  course.  That  sort  of 
domicile  is  frequently  a  confession — an  attempt 
to  conceal,  beneath  ample  appearances,  the 
mediocrity  and  shabbiness  of  the  owner's  life. 
On  the  back  road  is  not  the  same  temptation. 
I  should  say  that  a  roomy,  wide- windowed, 
deep-porched  dwelling,  built  there,  is  not  con- 
fession but  expression;  a  sort  of  naive  claim 
to  soul-room  and  dignity  of  spirit. 

"You  can  only  weigh  what  you  are,"  put 
in  a  youngster  watching  a  stranger's  antics 
on  an  automatic  weighing  machine.  "'Tain't 
no  use  to  swell  out  your  chest  and  jounce  up  and 
down  on  the  thing,  you  can  only  weigh  what  you 
are."  And  when  one  builds  a  house  to  live  in, 
personally,  it  isn't  much  use  to  build  it  bigger 
than  its  occupants.  Time  and  events  are  brutally 
frank  appraisers.  It  was  said,  a  generation  ago, 
of  a  famous  visiting  Celestial,  that  one  of  his 
first  questions,  upon  introduction  to  a  stranger, 
was  "Where  do  you  hve.''"  To  that  question,  one 
may  get  superficial  answer  from  the  list  of  tele- 
phone subscribers.  The  real  question,  however, 
is,  "How  much  do  you  live.'^"  Yes,  I  am  quite 
sure  that  the  back  road  has  its  mean  rivalries, 
its  raw  vanities,  its  uncouth  spirits.  Yet  I 
like  the  air  and  atmosphere  of  an  ample, 
well-mannered  place  on  the  back  road. 


THE  BACK  ROAD  101 

Moreover,  the  back  road  allows  time,  usually, 
for  neighborliness.  Not  so  much  style  to  be 
kept  up  at  all  costs.  Not  so  many  artificial 
demands  upon  time  and  purse.  Not  so  fre- 
quent social  "functions"  with  heart  omitted, 
and  with  elaborate  menus  to  help  cover  the 
lack.  Sometimes,  as  I  come  upon  the  Christ- 
like  solicitude  of  the  poor  for  their  own  kind; 
the  unrecking  generosity  of  the  poor  to  the 
poor  in  times  of  distress,  I  am  half  tempted 
to  believe  that  the  truest  generosity  and 
neighborliness  are  recorded  in  "the  short  and 
simple  annals  of  the  poor."  Certainly,  the 
dingy  streets,  the  alleys,  the  often  stifling 
tenements,  with  their  noisome  growths  of 
ignorance  and  bestiality,  grow  somewhat  else 
and  more — as  startlingly  fair  as  lilies  pushing 
up  from  black  ooze.  Such  pitifulness,  such 
reaches  of  often  clumsy  but  practical  sym- 
pathy, such  actual  sharing  of  the  last  loaf  of 
bread!  It  makes  the  princely  donatives  of  the 
opulent  seem  miserly  at  their  best.  One  who 
lives  on  the  main  street  needs,  usually,  to  go 
off  his  block  or  around  the  corner,  or  to  another 
neighborhood,  to  find  opportunity  to  invest 
his  sympathy-fund.  On  the  back  road  the 
case  is  different.  There  want  elbows  affluence; 
and  the  sight  of  the  undertaker's  wagon  is  a 
community  affair. 


102  CROSS-LOTS 

From  his  palatial  pile  on  the  turnpike.  Dives 
could  not  quite  see  the  plight  of  Lazarus.  And 
Sir  Launf  al  went  the  whole  length  of  the  high- 
way, in  sincere  quest  of  the  Holy  Grail.  'Twas 
on  the  back  road,  where  his  plenty  had  dwin- 
dled to  a  crust,  he  fed  the  beggar  whom  he 
had  passed  indifferently  on  his  feverish  out- 
ward journey;  and  learned,  to  his  happy  be- 
wilderment, that 

"The  Holy  Supper  is  kept,  indeed, 
In  whatso  we  share  with  another's  need; 
Not  what  we  give,  but  what  we  share. 
For  the  gift  without  the  giver  is  bare." 

Priest  and  Levite  were  front-road  churchmen. 
The  good  Samaritan  was  a  back-road  Chris- 
tian. Somewhere  in  his  soul,  if  not  in  the 
actual  flesh,  he  lived  next  door  to  suffering 
and  want  and  loneliness.  And  being  a  back- 
road  pilgrim  instead  of  a  front-road  celebrity, 
he  had  time  and  heart  for  a  broken  brother. 
His  "house  by  the  side  of  the  road"  had  taught 
him  to  be  a  "friend  to  man." 


IX 

PENTHOUSES 

Op  such  was  the  architectural  monstrosity 
that  caught  my  eye.  Very  obviously  that — 
after  a  moment's  consideration.  But,  during 
the  preliminary  moment,  I  permitted  myself 
some  speculation  and  protest:  speculation  as 
to  the  raison  d'etre  of  so  absurd-looking  a 
superstructure  upon  an  otherwise  comely  build- 
ing; protest  against  an  apparently  needless 
offense  to  good  taste.  It  was  both  absurd 
and  offensive.  Neither  window  nor  door  broke 
the  dull  sheer  of  its  walls.  A  skylight  above 
would  have  relieved  the  mental  situation  for 
me.  Being  naturally  curious,  and  a  Yankee  at 
that,  I  "wanted  to  know,"  as  I  always  do 
when  meanings  are  not  obvious.  And  I  halted 
my  step.  Then  knowledge  came.  A  wide,  if 
closed,  door  immediately  beneath  the  grotesque 
superstructure,  and  giving  to  the  street,  fur- 
nished clue.  The  entire  building  was  dedicated 
to  the  automobile  trade.  And  that  freakish  ex- 
tension of  the  sky  line  contained,  doubtless,  the 
hoisting  machinery  of  an  elevator.  In  other 
words  the  artistic  offense  was  a  penthouse. 

103 


104  CROSS-LOTS 

For  the  nonce  I  am  not  concerned  with  de- 
fending the  absurd  shape  of  the  superimposed 
structure.  Perhaps  the  day  will  yet  dawn  for 
birth  of  a  municipal  conviction,  with  com- 
mandments, against  any  and  all  depravity  in 
building  operations.  Taste  has  its  rights  as 
sacred  as  those  of  the  purse.  And  when  taste 
gets  its  full  day  in  court,  away  will  go  offensive 
signboards,  vulgar  advertising,  together  with  all 
building  construction  done  for  revenue  only. 
We  are  still  in  the  dark  ages  of  commercialism. 
Still  the  virtue  in  most  request  is  a  cash  divi- 
dend. Still  the  initial  question,  as  concerning 
an  investment  of  dollars,  is,  "Will  it  pay" — 
more  dollars  .'^  Even  philanthropy  puts  in  its 
appeal  against  any  spikenard  gift  which  does 
not  promise  to  bake  bread  or  provide  warm 
jackets  for  the  poor.  Only  this  morning  I 
heard  a  woman  complaining  because  the  money 
represented  in  a  piece  of  ecclesiastical  archi- 
tecture had  not  been  spent  in  hospital  equip- 
ment or  the  like.  Still,  as  of  old,  the  soul  has 
a  hard  time  getting  its  rights  as  against  the 
clamant  demands  of  the  body.  Bread,  bread, 
bread — and  again  bread,  forgetting  the  ancient 
confession  that  "man  doth  not  live  by  bread 
alone." 

"Die  when  I  may,"  said  one  of  earth's  great- 
est dreamers  who  also  was  an  earth  mover; 


PENTHOUSES  105 

"I  want  it  said  of  me  by  those  who  knew  me 
best,  that  I  always  planted  a  rose — where  I 
thought  that  a  rose  would  grow."  And,  from 
purely  utilitarian  angle,  a  rose  is  one  of  the 
most  extravagant  things  in  the  world.  It 
takes  soil  which,  otherwise  preempted,  might 
yield  wheat.  It  calls  for  strength  which,  other- 
wise employed,  might  run  spindles.  It  is 
beauty,  not  bread.  Yet,  by  productivity  of 
that  fine  sort,  was  the  Great  Commoner  pleased 
to  be  remembered  by  those  who  knew  him 
best.  Josiah  Wedgwood,  he  of  pottery  fame, 
did  not  say  the  thing  so  rhetorically  as  Lincoln 
did,  but  he  did  very  literally  the  thing  Lincoln 
was  describing.  The  first  contemporary  refer- 
ence to  the  now  famous  potter  may  be  found 
in  John  Wesley's  Journal,  and  on  this  wise: 
"I  have  met  an  interesting  man  by  the  name 
of  Josiah  Wedgwood.  He  has  planted  a  little 
garden  around  his  place  [the  pottery]  and  I 
am  sure  his  heart  must  be  near  to  God." 
Beautiful  inference,  indeed  (and,  incidentally, 
an  index  of  the  breadth  of  the  man  of  the 
cloth)  that  a  successful  manufacturer  should  be 
immortal  not  by  his  famous  product  but  by 
his  quiet  ministry  to  the  souls  of  his  em- 
ployees. Dear  to  God  not  so  much  for  com- 
mercial output  or  the  wages  he  paid  as  for  a 
sprinkling  around  his  pottery  of  those  "sweet- 


106  CROSS-LOTS 

est  things  God  ever  made  and  forgot  to  put 
a  soul  into."  Those  were  days  when  gardens 
were  chiefly  the  prerogative  of  the  rich.  For 
an  ordinary  man  to  poke  his  nose  into  a  cluster 
of  blossoms  in  a  rich  man's  garden,  was  a 
prison  offense.  So  this  stodgy  Briton  whose 
heart  Wesley  was  sure  must  be  near  to  God, 
"planted  a  little  garden  around  his  place," 
for  the  blessing  of  his  workmen.  Perhaps  they 
did  better  work.  Maybe  their  employer  knew 
that  they  would  do  better  work  for  the  touch 
of  beauty  dropped  into  their  lives.  At  least 
they  had  opportunity  to  be  larger  men — 
which  is  the  chief  desideratum. 

So  far  from  being  the  negation  of  useful- 
ness, beauty,  at  its  best  and  in  its  highest 
employ,  is  the  servitor  of  usefulness.  Those 
who  chatter  airily  about  beauty  for  beauty's 
sake  are  not  farther  from  the  truth  of  life  than 
are  we  who  have  brought  down  from  ancient 
philosophy  a  spleen  against  most  things  lovely 
to  behold.  Unless  God  thought  more  about 
grace  of  form  and  glory  of  tinting  than  do  a 
host  of  his  children,  this  were  a  hideous  old 
planet.  Despite  our  misplaced  emphases  and 
the  peril  of  the  pride  of  the  eyes,  God  con- 
tinues to  paint  the  heavens  with  a  color- 
splendor  which  is  the  despair  of  artists,  and  to 
clothe  the  flowers  of  the  field  with  frank  and 


PENTHOUSES  107 

unashamed  gorgeousness.  If  beauty  is  not 
bread,  at  least  it  feeds  the  part  of  a  man  that 
the  best  baker's  product  leaves  hungry.  There 
comes  back  to  me  the  great  window  in  the 
breakfast  room  of  a  Swiss  hotel.  Doubtless 
the  cuisine  was  excellent,  or  I  might  have 
remembered  the  place  disagreeably.  But  I've 
forgot  all  the  viands  I  ate  there,  and  the  faces 
of  the  waiters — even  the  size  of  my  bill.  All 
I  can  recall  is  the  outlook  across  Lake  Lucerne 
to  the  towering  mountains  beyond.  Height 
piled  against  height,  and  the  crest  of  eternal 
white  in  the  distance,  and  the  sun  climbing 
tirelessly  over  an  eastern  summit,  and  an 
alpine  horn  making  strange  voices  in  the  heart 
as  echo  called  from  peak  to  peak  while  I  was 
eating  my  breakfast.  How  little  the  meal 
counts  now,  whether  the  coffee  was  hot  or 
cold,  or  the  service  satisfactory,  as  against  the 
picture  that  hangs  unfaded  on  the  walls  of 
my  memory.  To  say  that  the  meal  tasted 
better  for  the  view  through  that  huge  win- 
dow is  to  tell  a  poor  half  truth.  God  was 
feeding  a  pilgrim  with  beauty,  as  God  has 
been  doing  ever  since  man  first  discovered  that 
earth  is  lovely  as  well  as  productive. 

But  I've  not  lost  sight  of  the  penthouse. 
I  am  thinking  of  it  with  appreciation  as  I  re- 
member the  purpose  it  serves  and   the  fine 


108  CROSS-LOTS 

lessons  it  teaches.  Unsightly  to  the  eye,  it 
nevertheless  housed  a  mechanism  that  defied 
gravitation  for  the  tenants  of  the  building. 
Formerly,  the  hoisting  apparatus  of  an  elevator 
was  constructed  in  the  basement,  with  what 
waste  of  power  machinists  were  slow  to  real- 
ize. Nowadays,  with  a  philosophic  wisdom  as 
profound  as  the  mechanical  advantage  secured, 
such  hoisting  devices  are  built  aloft.  Less 
cable,  less  waste  of  power,  less  wear  and  hazard 
— such  are  among  the  advantages  of  the  pent- 
house. 'Tis  the  direct  lift  inventors  have 
achieved — the  straight  pull  from  overhead. 
And  life  at  its  best  always  needs  that.  Life 
also  must  consider  the  question  of  wasted 
energy.  Life  at  its  flood  cannot  afford  to 
sacrifice  power.  As  with  elevators,  or  "lifts," 
as  our  British  cousins  call  them,  so  with  life 
— the  problem  is  not  to  lower  but  to  raise. 
Gravitation  may  be  trusted  to  attend  to  the 
lowering  function;  how  shall  we  elevate  with 
least  friction  and  peril  .^^  And  as  with  the 
modern  conveniences  that  substitute  for  stairs, 
so  with  life  itself — power  works  most  econom- 
ically from  above. 

Here  is  the  service  of  a  worthy  ambition. 
Ambition  pulls  a  man  up.  It  puts  a  wing  in 
place  of  a  fetter.  Whereas  the  grim  necessities 
of  life — the  need  of  bread  and  raiment  and 


PENTHOUSES  109 

amusement — may  hold  a  man  to  his  task, 
grimly,  perhaps,  if  not  desperately,  ambition 
sends  him  to  it  with  a  song  and  a  shout.  .He 
does  better  than  to  merely  accept  his  day's 
work :  he  chooses  it,  falls  in  love  with  it,  espouses 
it  with  ardor.  I  do  not  know  just  what  "sterner 
stuff"  Mark  Antony  thought  Caesar's  ambition 
should  have  been  made  of.  In  Brutus's 
opinion  it  evidently  was  "stern"  enough  already. 
All  real  ambition  is  stern  stuff,  albeit  shot 
through  with  fire,  and  streaked  with  crimson. 
Two  varieties  of  men  go  downtown  every 
business  morning.  Two  kinds  of  women  make 
the  beds  and  plan  the  meals  and  train  the 
children.  Two  kinds  of  children  gather  in 
every  schoolroom.  There  are  those  who  plod 
and  those  who  prance.  And  those  who  prance 
get  more  out  of  life  than  do  those  who  merely 
plod  through  the  day.  One  ought  to  win 
somewhat  besides  wages  out  of  his  day's 
fidelity.  He  ought  to  win  content  and  a  sense 
of  advancement.  He  ought  to  see  himself 
more  of  a  man,  and  on  his  way  to  a  goal  more 
worthful  than  a  full  stomach  and  a  com- 
fortable bed.  He  ought  to  feel  himself  grow 
toward  more  dignified  stature.  And  the  surest 
way  to  that  happiness  is  by  obedience  to  the 
pull  of  a  spiritualizing  ambition. 

Elbert  Hubbard   was  wont  to  write  much 


110  CROSS-LOTS 

of  the   "cosmic  urge,"   meaning  some  things 
that  look  better  unprinted.     But  if  there  is  a 
cosmic  urge,  dark,  sinister,  unlovely  in  many 
of   its   aspects,   there   is   also   a   cosmic   jmll, 
bright,  clear  and  full  of  healing.     Pity  not  to 
say   more   about   that.     Whereas   the   cosmic 
urge  allies  us  with  the  brute,  the  cosmic  pull 
declares  our  kinship  with  the  angels.    Potatoes 
will  sprout  in  a  cellar.     The  cosmic  urge  im- 
pels them  thus.    But  you  cannot  raise  a  crop 
of  potatoes  in  a  cellar.    For  that  consummation 
you   must   have   the   cosmic   pull   of   a   solar 
majesty.    I  have  seen  seeds  that  tried  to  grow 
in   the   dark.     Temperature,   moisture,   soil — 
so  far  the  conditions  were  all  that  a  seed  could 
ask;  yet  not  all  that  the  ordinary  seed  does 
ask  on  its  way  to  bloom  and  beauty.    The  un- 
healthy green  of  your  shadow-grown  plant  is 
plaintive   call   for   a   south   window   at   least, 
for  the  warm,  caressing  pull  of  the  sun.     The 
glow   from   overhead   does   for   a   plant   that 
which  no  lower  agent  can  effect.     Even  the 
pallid,  stunted  growth  of  a  tuba,  denied  sun- 
light, is  a  sort  of  wistful  reach  to  the  unseen 
sun. 

Thus,  in  life,  functions  a  worthful  ambition. 
It  puts  the  bloom  on  a  day's  duty.  It  trans- 
figures a  homely  task.  It  touches  with  adequate 
significance  all  prosaic  effort — poetizes  it,  so  to 


PENTHOUSES  111 

say.  Successive  days  of  otherwise  drudging 
labor  become  a  golden  cable  lifting  the  soul 
of  the  toiler.  To  do  each  stint  better  than 
its  predecessor;  to  build  a  better  wall  or  grow 
a  choicer  apple,  to  be  more  justly  proud  at 
the  end  of  each  toilsome  day,  such  is  the 
high  service  of  ambition — the  pull  from  the 
unseen. 

Similar  is  the  ministry  of  a  refining  ideal. 
I  do  not  know  what  sort  of  structure  Moses 
would  have  contrived  had  he  been  free  to 
select  his  model  on  earth.  "See  that  thou 
make  it  after  the  pattern  showed  thee  in  the 
mount,"  was  the  admonition.  The  tabernacle 
which  Moses  set  up  in  the  plain  had  no  counter- 
part except  on  high.  "Not  right,  not  right," 
protested  the  laddie  at  the  organ  as  he  struck 
chord  after  chord,  seeking  to  match  in  earth- 
tones  the  harmony  he  had  caught  from  the 
upper  air.  Beethoven  said  that,  some  days, 
the  very  atmosphere  seemed  full  of  voices 
calling  him  to  reproduce  their  ministrelsy. 
Is  this  the  trouble  with  much  of  our  music, 
as  with  a  flood  of  our  books  and  labors,  that 
their  authors  are  working  without  inspiration.'* 
Reahsm  copies  life  at  its  lowest,  allowing  not 
for  the  inrush  and  pull  of  great  forces  from 
above.  It  portrays  man  as  poorly  outgrown 
brute  instead  of  potential  angel.    Without  the 


112  CROSS-LOTS 

persistent  cry  and  puissant  lift  of  life's  most 
exalting  ideals,  one  gets  nowhere  except  to 
perdition.  To  "see  an  angel  in  the  stone," 
as  one  disappointed  sculptor  confessed,  even  if 
he  "cannot  get  it  out,"  saves  the  toiler  from 
sordidness  and  the  shame  of  not  aspiring. 
"Not  failure  but  low  aim  is  crime."  'Tis  the 
upward  pull  of  transforming  ideals  that  re- 
deems the  days. 

Or  the  clutch  of  a  pure  love.  Nothing  that 
has  been  written  can  fully  portray  the  demoral- 
ization of  a  low-pitched  love.  And  no  lan- 
guage can  do  more  than  suggest  the  refining 
and  greatening  influence  of  an  exalted  love. 
"Set  your  affection  on  things  above,"  chal- 
lenged one  of  the  great  voices  of  the  ages. 
I  do  not  understand  that  to  mean  angels  or 
golden  streets  or  impersonal  goodness.  It 
means  to  love  upward.  It  means  to  throne 
love  where  the  airs  are  cool,  sweet,  healing, 
and  the  pull  is  upward.  What  the  good  Bishop 
did  for  Valjean;  and  Mary  for  Bibbs,  in  Booth 
Tarkington's  delightful  story;  what  Monica 
did  for  Augustine,  and  a  golden-haired  lassie 
for  Silas  Marner,  and  his  Mamie  Rose  for 
Owen  Kildare,  is,  by  the  grace  of  a  God  of 
love,  being  done  every  hour  of  every  day  in 
the  year,  the  world  over.  What  cannot  be 
done  thus  may  well  be  despaired  of.     Love 


PENTHOUSES  113 

at  its  best  means  lift.     "Thou  hast  loved  up 
my  soul  from  the  pit,"  sang  a  minstrel  who 
knew  both  the  black  of  the  abyss  and  the  sun- 
bathed summits  of  redemption.     Sometimes  a 
man  can  be  pushed   up  from  squalor  of  life 
by  the  rough  hand  of  remorse.    Sometimes  he 
may  be  taunted  upward  by  derision  or  scorn. 
Sometimes,  touched  by  panic  to  do  the  appar- 
ently  impossible,   he   may   be   frightened   up. 
But  most  times,  if  he  gain  the  heights  at  all, 
he  must  be  loved  up.     Thus,  in  Browning's 
great  poem,  was  to  be  compassed  the  redemp- 
tion of  Saul.     Saul  had  not  been  unloving  or 
unloved.  He  had  loved  honor  and  the  plaudits  of 
the  crowd.    He  had  loved  battle,  and  the  music 
of  David's  harp.     He  had  loved  his  children 
almost  fiercely.    But  Saul's  love  never  got  far 
above    the   ground.      Love   pushed    him    and 
pulled  him,  never  lifted;  and  again  left  him 
melancholy  and  remorseful.    But,  according  to 
Browning's  great-pinioned  fancy,  David  sang 
of  a  day  when  Saul's  love  should  be  throned 
so  high  it  might  fling  open  the  gates  of  new 
life  to  him.     "O  Saul,  it  shall  be,  a  man  like 
to  me.  Thou  shalt  love  and  be  loved  by  for- 
ever." 

Always  the  lift.  Such  is  the  genius  of 
Christianity.  That  Man,  the  love  of  whom 
and  love  for  whom  was  to  conquer  the  tur- 


114  CROSS-LOTS 

bulent  Saul,  once  put  into  a  startling  metaphor 
his  philosophy  of  redemption:  "Except  a  man 
be  born  from  above."  His  scholarly  inter- 
locutor did  not  understand.  Multitudes  since 
have  affected  not  to  understand.  Even  the 
church  has  so  little  understood  that  it  has  tied 
to  a  figure  of  speech  a  fact  of  colossal  pro- 
portions and  age-long  reach.  Rebirths  of 
feeling,  of  purpose,  of  manhood  are  inadequate 
unless  the  birth  is  from  above.  Redemptive 
power  must  come  from  overhead.  The  en- 
ginery that  shall  yet  "lift  earth  and  bind  it 
as  with  chains  of  gold  about  the  feet  of  God," 
is  aloft — as  my  penthouse  reminded  me. 


X 

"SAY  IT— WITH  FLOWERS" 

Not  necessarily,  and  by  limitation,  with 
flowers.  In  its  familiar  use  the  exhortation 
smells  of  the  shop  as  unmistakably  as  of  garden 
or  greenhouse.  It  is  distinctly  commercial, 
phrased  with  a  frank  eye  to  business  by  ven- 
dors of  speaking  blooms.  Not  for  sake  of  the 
flowers,  nor  yet  for  the  enrichment  of  those 
to  whom  the  flowers  may  say  affectionate  or 
consolatory  things,  but  in  the  interest  of  the 
flower-mongers'  exchequer  are  we  recommended 
to  employ  such  fragrant  language.  Neverthe- 
less I  like  the  phrase:  "Say  it  with  flowers." 
Clever  "ad,"  it  is  also  a  deep  philosophy. 
With  a  nosegay  or  box  full  of  roses — sometimes 
by  a  nosegay  better  than  by  the  larger  quan- 
tity— one  can  express  such  various  sentiments. 
That  you  are  sorry  or  glad  with  the  recipient; 
that  you  remember  or  will  try  to  forget;  that 
you  are  entering  the  sacristy  of  the  other's 
felicity  or  pain,  or,  being  uninitiate,  that  you 
will  stand  at  the  door  until  the  other  comes 
forth — all  this  and  a  hundredfold  more  can 
be  said  with  flowers. 

116 


116  CROSS-LOTS 

Not  until  recently,  as  I  was  repeating  to 
myself  the  appeal  to  "say  it  with  flowers," 
did  I  realize  how  flexible  and  comprehensive 
is  their  language.  With  flowers  you  can  say 
almost  everything  except  that  you  hate:  flowers 
never  will  help  you  to  say  that.  Nor  does  the 
enterprising  florist  attempt  to  suggest  what 
you  shall  say.  That  is  your  part  of  the  enter- 
prise. His  to  supply  the  vocabulary,  so  to 
speak;  yours  to  select  the  particular  words 
required  for  your  message.  Indeed,  your  floral 
gift  can  say  things  for  the  expression  of  which 
a  dictionary  leaves  you  impotent;  things  of 
exquisite  delicacy  and  tender  meaning  that 
you  would  not  dare  to  put  into  words.  More- 
over, like  all  best  books  and  plays,  flower- 
language  leaves  somewhat  to  the  imagination. 
Heart  meanings  conveyed  by  flowers  become 
prismatic,  so  to  speak.  The  white  light  of  an 
everyday  message  or  confession  breaks  into  a 
perfect  shower  of  crimson,  violet,  and  gold. 

But  even  so  spermatic  a  power  as  imagina- 
tion ought  not  to  be  overloaded  with  respon- 
sibility for  adequate  interpretation  of  mean- 
ings implied.  Most  things  need  to  be  said — 
ought  to  be  said — in  some  dialect  or  other. 
Whether  with  flowers  or  what  else,  say  it. 
To  be  dumb  in  the  presence  of  joy  or  grief  or 
friendship  is  a  species  of  selfishness.   Taciturnity 


"SAY  IT— WITH  FLOWERS"  117 

is  not  merely  the  antithesis  of  loquacity: 
sometimes  it  falls  little  short  of  crime.  Of  all 
misers  the  niggard  with  words  is  least  ex- 
cusable. Lavish  hand  with  dollars  may  cost 
the  giver  a  pair  of  shoes  for  his  own  feet,  or  a 
canvas  for  his  walls,  or  a  trip  to  Europe.  Even 
in  the  tender  practice  of  beneficence — be  it  as 
perfect  as  Christ's — one  cannot  eat  his  cake 
and  have  it  too.  There  comes  before  me,  in 
memory,  the  unsoftened  face  of  a  multimil- 
lionaire who  frankly  declared  that,  if  peti- 
tioners for  his  bounty  realized  his  pain  in 
giving,  they  would  spare  him  the  suffering. 
He  loved  his  hoard  undiminished.  Broken  in 
upon  by  any  sort  of  largess,  it  seemed  to  him 
a  mutilated  thing — like  a  chipped  vase  or  a 
flawed  gem.  And,  taking  his  angle  of  vision, 
I  could  understand  even  if  I  could  not  condone. 
But  miserliness  with  kind  words — who  shall 
palliate  that.^  Ordinarily,  to  speak  the  gracious 
word  costs  little.  And,  ordinarily,  the  gift 
of  generous  speech  is  a  finer  gift  than  bread 
or  shoes.  I  have  seen  statistics  showing  the 
percentage  of  American  school  children  who  go 
supperless  to  bed  every  night,  and  the  mil- 
lions of  our  full  brothers  and  sisters  who  rarely 
experience  the  animal  felicity  of  a  full  stomach. 
But  where  is  the  census  of  half-famished  hearts 
hungering,  unwittingly  perhaps,  for  a  crust  of 


118  CROSS-LOTS 

encouragement  or  praise?  Tolstoy *s  beggar 
who,  in  the  thrill  of  a  sympathetic  word  spoken 
by  the  other,  forgot  his  bodily  need,  is  no 
fictional  instance.  "I  was  so  lonesome," 
sobbed  a  victim  of  man's  lust,  telling  the  new- 
old  story  of  her  downfall,  "and  his  was  the 
first  kind  word  I  had  heard  in  weeks."  Pity 
that  she  could  not  differentiate  between  whole- 
some and  poisoned  heart-food.  But,  granted 
the  same  heart-hunger,  I  am  not  certain  that 
her  contemners  would  do  much  better  than  she. 
A  famished  heart  is  poor  analyst  of  spiritual 
food-values.  All  innocent  and  unsuspecting,  it 
may  devour  the  morsel  which  destroys.  Hun- 
ger is  unreasoning,  imperious,  half  blind. 
It  wants — and  takes,  not  always  wisely.  Ours, 
then,  to  meet  with  bread  from  heaven  some 
part  of  the  heart's  clamant  hunger.  "Say  it 
with  flowers,"  with  chivalrous  conduct,  with 
pen  or  tongue,  but  by  all  means  say  it. 

Scholarship,  for  example,  is  not  an  asset;  it 
is  a  liability  until  it  finds  a  voice.  To  know 
for  the  sake  of  knowing  is  like  a  hat  for  its 
own  sake — irrespective  of  the  head  it  may 
cover;  like  wealth  for  its  own  sake — apart 
from  its  shining  uses  in  the  world;  like  art 
for  art's  sake — whatever  that  may  mean. 
"God  hath  given  me  the  tongue  of  the  learned," 
confessed  an  ancient,  "that  I  might  know  how 


"SAY  IT— WITH  FLOWERS"  119 

to  speak  a  word  in  season  to  him  that  is  weary." 
You  shall  go  far  to  find  a  profounder  apol- 
ogetic for  the  time  and  expense  required  to 
train  a  scholar.  Who  cares  how  much  we 
know  unless  we  use  it  for  the  enrichment  of 
others  .f^  Merely  to  be  wiser  than  one's  con- 
temporaries— in  history,  in  science,  in  religion 
— merely  to  be  able  to  pass  the  time  of  day 
in  the  vernacular  of  any  passer-by  is  as  meager 
compliment  as  to  record  that  a  man  has  twelve 
toes.  The  extra  toes  may  make  him  a  curi- 
osity: but  the  question  remains  whether  he 
can  walk  better  and  further  than  ordinary 
folks.  Saint  Paul  put  the  issue  bluntly :  "though 
....  I  understand  all  mysteries  and  all  knowl- 
edge ....  and  have  not  love,  I  am  nothing." 
Solomon  may  or  may  not  have  been  the  wisest 
man  of  his  day:  all  we  can  credit  him  with,  on 
account  of  his  reputation,  is  the  record  he  made 
asfruler,  and  the  proverbs  he  passed  down  to 
the  ages.  Solon's  fame  is  safe  in  the  laws  that 
bear  his  name.  One  difference  between  Eras- 
mus and  Martin  Luther  is  that,  for  safety's 
sake,  the  former  kept  his  convictions  to  him- 
self, while,  for  humanity's  sake,  the  latter  put 
his  convictions  out  to  service.  WTiat  boots  it 
to  the  world  that  Erasmus  was  the  wiser  of 
the  two  unless  his  superior  erudition  walked 
the  paths  of  men?     It  was  John  Burroughs,  as 


120  CROSS-LOTS 

I  recall,  who  characterized  Theodore  Roosevelt 
as  the  most  observant  naturalist  he  had  ever 
met.  At  least  that  strenuous,  myriad-minded 
man  could  tell  what  he  saw.  And,  in  the  last 
analysis,  that  is  what  counts;  it  is  all  that 
counts.  I  am  not  interested  in  the  songs  that 
Tennyson  hummed  over  in  his  soul  and  never 
sang,  but  I  bless  him  for  his  "In  Memoriam" 
and  "Crossing  the  Bar."  Every  real  book  is 
the  light  that  filters  through  the  soul  of  the 
author :  the  portion  he  absorbs  does  not  matter. 

Now  and  again  it  is  my  good  fortune  to  meet 
a  humble  pilgrim  whose  modest  store  of  knowl- 
edge means  more  to  a  neighborhood  than  does 
the  mental  hoard  of  a  dozen  savants.  Such 
a  mortal  lived  in  the  windmill  shop,  in  Lin- 
coln's delightful  story.  Measured  in  printer's 
"M's,"  his  sentences  were  almost  grotesquely 
short.  He  was  a  blundering  sort  of  lover. 
Yet  he  managed  to  speak  forth  a  few  things 
greatly.  He  knew  how  to  "say  it."  And 
often  I  prefer  that  halting  speech  which 
scarcely  bears  its  weight  of  precious  meanings. 
By  all  means,  if  possible,  a  trained  mind  and 
facile  tongue — providing  these  forget  not  the 
augmented  obligation  implied.  Every  fresh 
enduement  of  wisdom  puts  its  possessor  under 
bonds  to  say,  more  handsomely,  his  best  word. 

Not  long  ago,  in  a  high  grade  pharmacy,  I 


"SAY  IT— WITH  FLOWERS"  121 

found  myself  standing  before  shelves  of  pro- 
prietary medicines.  I  was  not  interested  in 
the  labels:  I  was  pondering  their  frank  viola- 
tion of  a  beautiful  ethic.  Every  secret  com- 
pound in  that  store  reads  its  author  out  of 
good  standing  in  the  medical  profession.  No 
physician  dares  to  hold  back  from  the  use 
of  his  fraternity  any  special  skill  he  has  acquired 
in  treating  disease.  By  the  genius  of  his 
vocation  he  owes  to  the  world  of  sick  folk  the 
benefit  of  his  discovery.  He  cannot  keep  it:  he 
must  say  it.  When  the  issue  is  drawn  between 
revenue  and  professional  obligation,  the  or- 
dinary practitioner  does  not  hesitate.  With  a 
magnanimity  which  the  merchant  cannot  under- 
stand the  doctor  gives  his  secret  away.  By  so 
much  as  it  was  his,  it  now  belongs  to  mankind. 
If  not  for  the  sake  of  his  fellows,  then  at  least 
for  the  sake  of  his  own  regularity,  he  relin- 
quishes claim  to  the  sole  usufruct  of  his  advan- 
tage. Even  our  patent  laws  deny  to  the 
inventor  a  life  use  of  his  special  device.  After 
seventeen  years  his  invention  belongs  to  the 
world.  Ultimately  he  must  say — or  the  law 
of  limitation  will  say  for  him — the  word  whose 
withholding  for  a  term  made  him  rich. 

Thus,  in  many  ways,  human  society  is  be- 
ginning to  admit  the  obligation  of  each  member 
of  the  group  to  say  the  best  thing  he  knows. 


122  CROSS-LOTS 

Call  it  socialism  or  utopianism   or   quixotism 
or  what  you  please,  still  the  ineluctable  obliga- 
tion remains.     And  some  day  we  shall  catch 
up    with    that    dream.      Into   every    personal 
advantage  there  enters   always   the  factor  of 
the    unearned    increment.      Proprietorship    is 
relative  rather  than  absolute.    The  old  defiance 
of  arrogant  privilege,  "Is  it  not  lawful  for  me 
to  do  what  I  will  with  mine  own.'^"  is  meeting 
some   sharp   and   startling   denials   nowadays. 
And  the  real  basis  of  such  denials  is  the  fact 
that  we  are  seldom   "owners."     Some  of  us 
are  merely  "squatters"  on  the  domain  we  lord 
it  over.     Some  are  accredited  tenants.     Some 
have  long  leaseholds.    None  possess  the  prop- 
erty in  fee.     Caruso  does  not  own  the  voice 
with    whose    resonance    he    has    earned    such 
fabulous   sums.      Perhaps,   if   he   realized   his 
restricted  right  in  such  talent,  he  would  sing 
with  a  different  quality.    H.  G.  Wells  does  not 
own  the  books  that  carry  his  name  on  their 
title  pages.     The  copyright  may  be  his,  but, 
conceivably,   the   Crown  might   step   in,   any 
ordinary   day,   to   dispute   his   claim.      Wana- 
maker  does  not  own  the  great  business  he  has 
built,  and  would  not  even  if  every  dollar  repre- 
sented in  it  were  his.     For  adequate  cause  the 
courts  could   close  his   doors   to-morrow.     So 
long  as  a  man  lives  among  men  he  owes  them 


"SAY  IT— WITH  FLOWERS"  123 

part  of  the  benefit  of  his  enterprise,  his  skill, 
his  talent. 

As  a  new  resident  of  a  certain  American 
city  I  was  puzzled  for  a  time  over  the  frequent 
references  to  "ground  rents."  The  phrase  was 
not  novel  but  the  frequency  of  its  use.  I 
learned  that  whole  blocks  of  modern  buildings 
stand  on  land  owned  by  others.  I  heard  people 
talk  of  buying  ground  rents  as  an  investment. 
Then  the  explanation  came  out.  Big  tracts 
of  now  improved  property  were  "Crown-lands" 
originally.  Held  by  the  "reigning  house"  for 
revenue's  sake,  or  granted  to  this  or  that 
court  favorite,  they  made  fixed  recognition  to 
the  owners.  Passed  down  from  one  generation 
to  the  next,  or  hawked  about  in  trade,  still 
they  held  the  tradition.  Even  to  the  present 
day  of  apartment  houses  and  sky-scrapers, 
they  memorialize,  in  the  way  of  ground  rent, 
a  first  ownership  by  the  "Crown."  But  I  am 
not  personally  interested  in  such  property 
limitations;  what  does  interest  me  is  that  a 
similar  practice  runs — or  ought  to  run — 
through  life  in  its  manifold  aspects.  Seldom 
are  we  permitted  to  be  owners  in  fee.  Every 
special  grace  or  talent  is  held  by  grant  from 
the  real  owner.  Every  patch  of  privilege  we 
cultivate  is  a  bit  of  crown-land.  Tissot's  skill 
with  a   brush,   Marconi's   epochal   invention, 


124  CROSS-LOTS 

Burbaiik*s  wizardry  with  plant  life,  Bryan's 
power  over  an  audience,  owe  tribute.  And 
when  God  is  landlord,  the  "ground-rents"  are 
payable,  not  for  the  filling  of  celestial  coffers 
but  for  the  enrichment  and  comfort  of  God's 
children  on  earth.  "Finding  is  keeping,"  we 
used  to  say  in  childhood.  No;  finding  implies 
obligation.  It  binds  us  in  honor  to  declare 
ourselves.  If  we  have  been  "anointed  with 
the  oil  of  gladness,  above  our  fellows,"  we 
must  say  so. 

And  so,  preeminently,  with  the  riches  of 
affection.  "My  son  knows  that  I  love  him," 
argued  a  woman  in  defense  of  her  cold  re- 
serve. "Why  should  I  be  forever  telling  him 
of  my  devotion  when  he  knows  it  without  my 
telling?"  Very  likely  he  does  know  it,  but 
I  think  he  would  like  to  hear  it  said.  As 
between  a  love  whose  only  proof  is  its  honeyed 
"tellings,"  and  a  love  which  never  confesses 
itself  in  words,  I  suppose  I  should  choose  the 
latter.  No  amount  of  rhetorical  asseveration 
can  substitute  for  the  quickened  beat  of  a 
heart,  nor  long  deceive  the  object.  But  granted 
that  deep,  sanctifying  commitment  of  the  heart, 
I  am  a  firm  believer  in  the  obligation  to  tell  it 
with  reasonable  iteration.  Priscilla,  with  a 
woman's  almost  uncanny  intuition,  knew  per- 
fectly well  what  fires   were  glowing  in  John 


"SAY  IT— WITH  FLOWERS"  125 

Alden's  heart.  I  suppose  she  could  feel  the 
heat — and  was  glad.  Still  she  would  have  been 
but  half  a  woman — nay,  but  half  human — 
unless  she  longed  to  hear  him  confess  the  mo- 
tive that  lay,  poorly  hid,  behind  his  more 
obvious  errand.  And  her  forthright  challenge 
that  he  should  "speak  for  himself,"  is  simply 
a  frank  assertion  of  the  duty  of  putting  into 
speech  the  great  cry  of  the  heart. 

"If  you  have  a  friend  worth  loving, 
TeU  him  so" 

Doubtless  he  may  have  every  other  reason 
to  count  himself  your  friend.  Sleeping  or 
waking,  he  may  expect  your  trust  to  lodge 
at  his  door.  By  acts  of  fidelity  and  thought- 
fulness  you  have  made  him  sure.  Yet  all 
these  witnesses  do  not  release  you  from  the 
necessity  of  telling  him  in  words.  Somehow 
— though  by  no  mystery  at  all — friendship 
warms  with  new  quality  when  you  look  into 
another's  eyes  and  tell  him  how  much  he  means 
to  you.  Words  are  sacred  when  they  are 
freighted  with  heart.  Nothing  else  takes  the 
place  of  a  great,  quivering  word.  God's  su- 
preme revelation  of  himself  was  not  sunshine, 
nor  rain,  nor  symbols,  but  a  Word — the  utter 
and  all  convincing  Incarnate  Word. 

Religion  itself  needs  to  be  vocal.     I  do  not 


126  CROSS-LOTS 

mean  vociferous  or  declamatory,  but  vocal. 
It  cannot  completely  express  itself  in  votives 
and  self-restraints,  nor  yet  in  all  ministry  and 
active  goodness.  It  needs  also  to  find  voice. 
The  old-fashioned  "testimony  meeting,"  not- 
withstanding its  sometime  crudities  and  its 
perils  of  Pharisaism,  served  a  vital  purpose  in 
the  soul's  economy.  God  ought  not  to  be  ex- 
pected to  read  all  our  gratitude  "glowing  in  our 
ravished  hearts,"  as  the  hymn  suggests  he  may 
need  to  do.  Gratitude,  the  joy  of  forgiveness, 
the  passion  of  a  new  life  ought  to  declare  them- 
selves expressively  and  in  season.  "Let  the 
redeemed  of  the  Lord  say  so."  "Say  it  with 
flowers"  or  oblations,  with  prayers,  with 
gladness,  with  unwincing  heroism  or  blood- 
sweat  of  struggle,  but  say  it. 


XI 

THE  "SET" 

I  AM  not  defending  the  grammar  of  the 
word.  It  is  exceedingly  difficult  to  justify,  by 
cold  rules  of  syntax,  certain  highly  expressive 
terms.  Indeed,  the  special  combination  of 
letters  at  the  head  of  this  chapter  is  sorely 
misused.  Many  a  literate  farmer  persists  in 
characterizing  as  a  "setting"  hen,  the  barn- 
yard fowl  thus  maternally  occupied.  Every 
well-informed  person  knows  perfectly  well  that 
the  sun  does  not  "set"  in  the  west  or  anywhere 
else.  The  supernal  glory  at  the  end  of  a  per- 
fect day  is  a  sunsit.  To  be  exact  in  the  use 
of  English,  your  enraptured  beholder  of  God's 
artistry  at  sundown  "sets"  as  grammatically  as 
the  sun  does. 

Thus,  for  better  or  worse,  we  occasionally 
take  out  of  the  hands  of  lexicographers  a  few 
parts  of  common  speech.  Soon  or  late  every 
dictionary  has  to  admit  to  its  erudite  pages 
words  whose  sole  warrant  for  such  select  com- 
pany is  popular  usage.  Language  is  by  no 
means  chopped  out  in  a  mill:  it  grows,  or  is 
worn  smooth  in  the  mouths  of  people.    And  if, 

127 


128  CROSS-LOTS 

in  the  course  of  human  events  and  under 
stress  of  circumstances,  a  carpenter's  chisel 
may  be  pressed  into  service  as  a  screwdriver, 
or  great  Caesar's  dust  be  employed  to  stuff  a 
knothole,  why  should  not  an  adjective  be 
allowed  to  function  as  a  noun,  or  a  transitive 
verb  become  intransitive?  Purists  and  prudes 
are  quite  as  annoying  in  the  realm  of  lan- 
guage as  anywhere  else.  Life  is  so  short  at  the 
longest,  and  there  is  so  much  to  be  said,  one 
cannot  afford  to  badger  himself  and  his  con- 
temporaries over  trifles  of  syntactical  finesse. 
The  chief  desideratum,  after  all,  is  to  get  one- 
self understood;  and  if  a  double  negative  or 
an  indefensible  pronoun  seems  to  advance  the 
process,  why  grow  hectic  about  it?  No  less  an 
authority  than  Professor  Lounsbury  himself  ad- 
mitted that  overfastidiousness  in  matters  of 
grammar  and  pronunciation  argues  a  petty 
mind. 

But  my  special  word,  "set."  It  does  not 
appear  in  the  dictionary  with  the  signification 
herewith  attached.  It  belongs  to  the  vernac- 
ular of  the  sea.  And  in  such  company  it  has 
a  precise  and  important  meaning.  I  heard  it 
first  on  Long  Island  waters,  as  I  recall.  Speak- 
ing of  the  tide  in  its  relation  to  their  craft, 
some  of  my  aquatic  friends  referred  to  the 
"set."     It   describes   the   action   of   the   tide 


THE  "SET"  129 

against  the  sides  of  a  vessel.  No  mariner  can 
steer  his  craft  straight  across  that  mysterious 
flux  that  we  call  the  tide.  Silent  and  inev- 
itable as  death,  resistless  as  the  pull  of  the 
planets,  the  "set"  must  always  be  taken  into 
account.  Again  and  again  have  I  watched 
the  phenomenon;  pleased,  exasperated  or  merely 
interested,  according  to  its  effect  upon  my 
water  journey.  Ignoring  the  "set"  of  the 
tide,  rocks  and  shoals  offer  fresh  menace,  and 
harbor  lights  may  gleam  in  vain.  Always  the 
"set"  where  the  tide  runs.  The  wise  mariner 
is  forever  on  guard.  Even  when  he  cannot 
see,  still  he  makes  allowance  for  the  "set." 
Such  silent,  puissant  forces  are  no  respecter 
of  persons  or  seasons  or  convenience. 

Nor  is  the  case  different  with  respect  to  the 
voyage  we  call  life.  One  recalls  the  familiar 
allegorical  painting,  known  by  small  repro- 
ductions in  so  many  homes:  a  skiff  slipping 
gracefully  down  stream,  a  radiant-faced  girl 
for  passenger  and  a  mysterious  figure  at  the 
stern.  How  little  the  enraptured  passenger 
recks  time,  tempest,  or  tide.  The  voyage  itself 
is  all-fascinating.  To  suggest  the  perils  of  it 
seems  ungenerous.  May  it  not  be  kinder  to 
let  the  pilgrim  of  the  infinite  sail  on  and  on, 
unwitting  and  unalarmed?  One  hates  to  be 
the  bearer  of  disquieting  tidings.    Soon — some- 


130  CROSS-LOTS 

times  tragically  soon — comes  threat  of  storm. 
Whereat  the  panic-touched  passenger  may  so 
shorten  sail  as  to  make  no  voyage  at  all. 
"That  poor  boy,  Keats,*'  singularly  gifted 
and  pathetically  sensitive  to  the  wind  in  his 
face,  felt  that  all  was  storm.  Long  before 
the  fatal  voyage  which  ended  in  the  surf,  near 
Fire  Island  Light,  Margaret  Fuller  Ossoli 
"accepted  the  universe,"  pain  and  blight  in- 
cluded, with  stoic  spirit.  John  La  Farge,  whose 
fame  was  won  too  late  to  salve  his  soul,  felt 
that  life  was  cruelly  hard.  To  accept  night  and 
head  winds  and  hurricanes  of  pain,  and  not  to 
cease  expecting  rosy  mornings  and  shining 
reaches  of  blue  water,  is  noble  achievement. 

Nor  to  forget  the  "set"  of  the  tide.  Some- 
times I  fancy  that  the  pressure  of  that  tide 
"which  moving,  seems  asleep"  plays  a  larger 
part  than  do  our  fixed  determinations  in  the 
issues  of  the  voyage.  In  every  life,  as  in 
institutions  and  civilizations,  forces  of  deathly 
quiet  work  for  good  or  ill.  To  measure  them 
is  almost  impossible:  they  are  felt  rather  than 
mensurable.  Quite  as  often  they  are  not  even 
felt.  Cromwell's  "Ironsides"  cannot  truthfully 
be  described  as  an  upheaval  of  well-directed 
wrath  against  the  Stuarts.  Those  unwhipped, 
psalm-chanting  troops  illustrated  and  accented 
a   "set"   of   tidal   sentiment  in  England.     In 


THE  "SET"  131 

all  their  unapologetic  vehemence  there  was  a 
sort  of  inevitable  quality.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  "set"  was  against  the  reigning  house  and 
a  time-serving  Parliament.  Heat  gathers  slowly 
in  the  Briton,  but,  once  gathered,  it  is  white. 
I  doubt  if  the  average  Englishman  sensed  the 
force  of  the  movement  deflecting  his  course. 
'Twas  not  really  the  race-storm  from  the 
north,  sweeping  down  across  the  Alps,  that 
destroyed  the  Rome  of  the  Caesars.  Nations 
are  seldom  if  ever  blasted  by  irruption.  Silently 
the  effeminacy  and  venality  of  Roman  life 
had  been  at  work,  undermining,  corroding. 
Rome  was  far  off  her  course  when  Goth  and 
Vandal  struck.  'Twas  the  set  of  the  tide  that 
accomplished  her  ruin.  According  to  historic 
record,  Aaron  Burr  took  the  Hfe  of  his  brilliant 
rival.  But,  according  to  a  deeper  reading  of 
the  story,  the  great  Federalist  invited  death. 
Keen,  convinced,  prophetic,  Hamilton  was  con- 
stantly being  defeated  by  an  unseen  and 
unrecognized  foe.  God  never  can  make  max- 
imum use  of  an  irregular  life.  The  set  of  the 
tide  was  against  Hamilton — as  against  his 
truculent  rival.  Not  even  the  purity  of  his 
political  motive  saved  him.  Say  that  it  saved 
his  reputation  as  patriot  and  statesman,  not 
the  man  himself. 

Doubtless    there    is    what    Thorold    Rogers 


132  CROSS-LOTS 

called  an  "economic  interpretation  of  history." 
In  the  world-wide  scuffle  for  bread,  in  the  un- 
equal   distribution    of    those    material    advan- 
tages for  possession  of  which  individuals  and 
nations  forget  everything  else,  must  be  sought 
the  key  to  many  of  the  most  epochal  changes 
of  government  and  national  boundary.    Leaving 
out  of  account  the  infamous  "Corn  Laws"  of 
England,   you   cannot   write   intelligently   the 
history  of  that  century   in  Britain.     But  for 
her  interference  with  our  breadbox,  and  par- 
ticularly, our  tea-caddie,  we  might  have  gone 
on    being    friends    with    the    mother    country 
indefinitely.     Marie  Antoinette's  famous  neck- 
lace was  merely  a  last  straw  of  affront  to  a 
half-starved  French  populace,  concerning  whom, 
being  asked   what   they   were   to  eat,  Foulon 
replied,   "Let   them  eat  grass."     One  cannot 
read  the  chronicle  of  current  events  in  these 
strange,    seething   times   and   fail   to   see   the 
dinner-pail  loom  huge.     Food  in  Russia,  and 
in  adequate  supply,  at  the  moment  when  Bol- 
shevism   was    a-borning,    would    have   turned 
their  blades  soft  in  the  hands  of  Lenin  and 
Trotsky. 

But  if  there  is  an  ''economic  interpretation  of 
history,"  there  is  also  a  still  deeper,  a  moral 
interpretation,  of  which  even  Gibbon  admitted 
the  signs.    Man  is  not  all  stomach;  he  is  soul 


THE  "SET"  133 

also.  He  cannot  live  by  bread  only.  He  is 
subject  to  heart-hungers,  mind-hungers,  spirit- 
hungers.  He  is  called  by  imperious  voices, 
some  elfish,  some  divine.  He  is  played  upon 
by  forces  malefic  or  benign,  of  whose  operation 
and  intent  he  is  childishly  unaware.  As  an 
individual  or  in  the  mass  he  moves  blindly, 
inconsequently  as  often  as  of  reasoned  pur- 
pose. He  feels,  even  when  least  conscious  of 
it,  the  set  of  the  tide.  He  lands  where  he  did 
not  intend,  slips  into  ports  of  which  he  never 
dreamed.  History — which  is  biography  writ 
large — is  full  of  start  and  surprise,  of  de- 
pressing retroversions  and  brilliant  recoveries 
which  never,  except  in  moral  terms,  can  be 
explained.  Real  tragedy  is  always  ethical. 
That  a  robin's  eggs  are  left  unhatched,  or 
dragons  tear  each  other  in  their  slime  is  not 
tragedy.  Tragedy  is  when  a  man  goes  wrong, 
or  a  nation  falls  morally  insolvent,  or  a  race 
makes  a  "god  of  its  belly."  To  lose  one's 
friend  by  death  is  not  tragedy:  tragedy  is  to 
lose  him  by  moral  default,  by  deceit,  by 
perfidy.  For  crops  to  fail  and  pestilence  to 
rage  through  a  land  is  calamity:  but  for  that 
same  country  to  forfeit  its  ideals  or  be  scourged 
with  hypocrisy  and  falsehood  is  tragedy.  I 
am  not  thinking  of  head  winds;  I  am  thinking 
of  the  insidious  set  of  the  tide. 


134  CROSS-LOTS 

Not  long  before  the  war  cloud  broke  over 
Europe,  William  James  pleaded  for  "the  moral 
equivalent  of  war,"  as  a  hardener  of  ethical 
tissue,  a  school  of  the  heroic  in  modern  life. 
Then  came  the  deluge;  and  through  the  wrack 
we  glimpsed  the  heroic  spirit  clothing  itself  in 
a  hundred  splendid  forms  of  fortitude  and 
sacrifice.  And  we  were  proud,  spite  of  the 
orgy  of  chicane  and  profiteering  to  which  the 
war  gave  play.  Not  even  the  bestial  con- 
comitants of  the  struggle  could  wholly  blind 
us  to  the  nobilities  brought  into  shining  exer- 
cise. Then  the  storm  passed  by,  and  we 
looked  for  a  perpetuation  of  the  heroic  spirit 
in  days  of  peace.  Alas !  that  which  we  actually 
see  is  so  dismally  different  from  that  we 
dreamed  and  prophesied.  Life  seems  pitched 
to  a  lower  key  than  before  the  war.  Philistin- 
ism, covert  or  rampant,  has  an  alarming  vogue. 
Menacing  the  voyage,  both  of  the  individual 
and  of  the  nation,  if  not  of  civilization  itself, 
is  the  persistent  well-nigh  irresistible  set  of 
the  tide — the  tide  of  a  materialism  at  once 
bouffe  and  banal.  On  the  stage,  at  the  movies, 
in  the  street,  behind  the  counter,  on  the 
printed  page,  and  in  ordinary  socialism  by 
whatever  name,  one  can  feel  when  he  cannot 
see  the  movement  of  it. 

Examples  are  so  numerous  that  the  chron- 


THE  "SET"  135 

icier  scarcely  knows  where  to  begin;  and, 
wherever  beginning,  is  pretty  sure  to  be  called 
an  old  fogy,  if  not  a  Pharisee,  for  his  protest- 
ing voice.  Take  the  stage,  whether  in  its 
older  form  or  its  filmed  evolution.  No  occasion 
to  go  to  the  prude  for  fulmination  against  the 
prevailing  tone  of  the  theater.  All  one  need 
do  is  to  read  the  dramatic  critics.  Even  where 
they  do  not  condemn  expressly,  their  comment 
suffices  to  frame  the  indictment.  Pruriency 
hardly  takes  the  trouble  to  veil  itself  in  the 
modern  drama.  Indecency  stalks  before  the 
footlights,  unashamed  and  unapologetic.  Even 
the  so-called  "clean  play"  usually  has  to  be 
spiced  cleverly  so  as  to  interest  the  sensualist 
while  not  offending  the  moralist.  One  of  the 
great  actors  of  a  generation  ago  is  quoted  as 
saying  that  he  would  not  permit  his  family 
to  see  a  new  play  until  he  had  witnessed  it 
beforehand.  I  wonder  how  many  playhouses 
he  would  need  to  visit  to-day  before  he  found 
a  show  that  he  considered  fit  for  decent  eyes. 
When  a  refined  young  woman  returned  from 
a  popular  theater  recently,  with  face  aflame 
and  voice  indignant,  I  knew  at  once  that  she 
was  not  a  frequenter  of  the  play,  else  she  must 
have  lost  the  blazing  sign  of  an  outraged 
womanhood.  Say  that  the  stage,  like  current 
literature,  i^  merely  the  mirror  held  up  to  life; 


136  CROSS-LOTS 

or  that  playwrights  provide  the  sort  of  proven- 
der the  public  demands,  still  the  confession 
comes  to  the  same  thing — stark  materialism. 
Whether  we  stress  the  commercial  interest  of 
the  manager,  or  the  salacious  interest  of  the 
unholy-minded,  or  the  pleasure-mongering  in- 
terest of  the  careless  crowd,  the  finding  is  one 
— materialism.  Life  hysteric  where  it  is  not 
erotic;  life  appraised  under  the  dollar  sign 
where  it  is  not  even  more  soddenly  rated — 
this  is  the  life  that  stage  and  movie-house  are 
purveying  to  the  multitudes,  including  millions 
of  children.  And  the  theme  is  the  apotheosis 
of  the  body. 

Modern  fashion,  particularly  in  the  gowning 
of  women,  makes  the  same  confession.  If 
old-fashioned  modesty  is  not  dead  nowadays, 
it  is  sorely  in  need  of  revivifying.  One  of  my 
friends,  by  no  means  an  octogenarian,  ob- 
serves that  time  was,  within  easy  memory, 
when  he  could  differentiate,  by  their  street 
costume  and  cosmetics,  between  the  scarlet 
woman  and  her  chaste  sisters.  Must  it  be 
that,  with  the  advent  of  a  new  feminism,  the 
old,  wholesome,  and  sanctifying  femininity  has 
gone.''  Will  the  new  day  come  in  by  leveling 
down  instead  of  up.^  Were  the  old  reserves 
and  delicacies  so  outworn  and  obsolete  that 
they  serve  no  purpose  in  the  new  order?    Can 


THE  "SET"  1S7 

the  woman  who  expects  to  exact  the  old 
reverences  of  chivalry  afford  to  exploit  broad- 
cast the  physical  charm  and  shy  appeal  of  her 
sex?  Frankly,  there  is  call  to  be  ashamed  for 
if  not  of  the  women  of  the  mode.  And  when 
defense  of  the  indecencies  of  modern  costuming 
is  offered  in  the  name  of  economy  of  material, 
one  scarcely  knows  whether  to  rage  or  to  weep. 
Oh,  thrice  sly  materialism,  snatching  modest 
coverings  from  limb  and  neck  in  the  name  of 
style!  Thrice  purblind  sisters  of  ours,  to  be 
coaxed  out  of  the  citadel  of  womanly  safety 
by  such  specious  glorification  of  the  body !  I 
hold  that  'twas  given  to  women  to  keep  remind- 
ing us  forever  that,  while  we  have  bodies,  we  are 
souls.  And  when  woman,  the  natural  high 
priestess  of  idealism,  by  seductive  indirection 
helps  put  emphasis  upon  the  flesh  as  opposed 
to  spirit,  one  shudders  to  name  the  port  at 
which  the  set  of  the  tide  may  land  us. 

Of  the  modern  dance  with  its  short  remove 
from  phallic  revel;  of  current  advertising  with 
its  impudicitous  asseveration  of  the  claims  of 
the  carcase;  of  emphasis  upon  gustatory  delights 
and  lust  of  gain;  of  literature  in  the  Sunday 
supplements  or  periodical  form  or  erotic  novel; 
of  pictorial  art,  or  of  the  musical  muse  with 
its  syncopated  measures  and  innuendos  of 
passion — of  all  these  instances  and  more  one 


138  CROSS-LOTS 

need  hardly  speak.  Allusion  is  adequate.  But 
not  even  education  escapes.  Beneath  the 
arches  of  the  beautiful  temple  of  learning  seeps 
that  insidious  tide  whose  set  cries  peril.  Of 
course  an  education  is  by  no  means  for  its 
own  sake  any  more  than  a  sword  is,  or  a  paint- 
ing of  Millet's,  or  a  beehive,  or  an  overcoat. 
Education  is  for  the  sake  of  the  world  which 
the  trained  mind  may  more  intelligently  and 
adequately  serve.  But  to  ask  brazenly  of 
education,  how  much  more  bread  it  will  bake, 
how  fast  it  will  advance  the  student  on  his 
way  to  self-aggrandizement,  or  what  added 
powers  it  will  vest  in  him  for  personal  ad- 
vantage, is  a  species  of  harlotry — a  profanation 
to  which  the  emphasis  laid  upon  athletic 
prowess  may  easily  lend  itself.  Notwithstand- 
ing the  eloquent  Rooseveltian  defense  of  col- 
lege football  and  the  like,  one  is  tempted  to 
stop  and  ask  Browning's  great  question: 

"Thy  body  at  its  best. 
How  far  will  it  advance  thy  soul  on  its  lone  way?" 

And  then  there  is  socialism  in  its  variant 
forms,  all  the  way  from  parlor  schemes  of  race- 
improvement  to  Bolshevism  in  its  most  violent, 
and  destructive  type.  Dreams  are  in  it,  the 
dreams  of  gentle  spirits  like  Kingsley;  and 
prayers,  the  rarefied  prayers  of  Maurice  and 


THE  "SET"  139 

his  kind;  and  protests  as  pure  as  mothers' 
against  the  despoiling  of  their  sons.  In  a  sense, 
Jesus  himself  may  be  claimed  as  the  protago- 
nist of  social  reform.  But  the  socialism  of 
Jesus  put  bread  below  brain  in  the  scale  of 
values.  The  kingdom  he  preached  did  not 
imply  pianos  in  every  home,  and  silk  raiment 
for  everybody,  and  soft,  white  hands.  His 
own  were  scarred  for  the  sake  of  his  soul  and 
the  souls  of  his  brethren.  His  dream  was  of 
spirit  eminent,  supreme.  Whereas,  in  the  final 
analysis,  most  programs  of  modern  social 
betterment  end  with  ampler  housing  conditions 
and  a  larger  share  of  the  materialities  of  earth's 
garner.  In  other  words,  the  Eutopia  of  most 
modern  propagandists  of  social  reform  is  a 
Valhalla  of  the  body. 

But  it  were  unfair  to  the  facts  to  leave  the 
picture  wholly  dark.  If  there  is  a  set  of  the 
tide  that  spells  disaster,  there  is  also  a  set 
toward  safe  harbor.  "If  there  be  a  devil  in 
man"  making  him  easy  prey  to  materialistic 
forces,  "there  is  an  angel  too"  which  breaks 
the  owner's  heart  when  he  loses  the  trail. 
"God  hath  not  left  himself  without  a  witness 
at  any  time,"  in  the  resistances  men  feel  to 
their  own  unworthy  drift,  and  the  redemption 
they  dream  if  they  do  not  accomplish.  If 
there  is  a  tide  which  carries  us  beyond  our 


140  CROSS-LOTS 

reckoning  in  evil,  there  is  also  a  tide  which 
sometimes  urges  us  to  refinements  of  man- 
hood and  renunciation  of  selfish  interest  scarcely 
dreamed  of.  Herbert  Spencer's  "Power  not 
ourselves  that  makes  for  righteousness"  is 
ceaselessly  making  for  righteousness.  Augustine 
became  a  better  man  than  he  planned  or  the 
logic  of  his  early  years  argued.  William  Wilber- 
force  fell  victim  to  the  moral  nausea  of  his 
dissolute  ways,  and  in  the  reaction  was  healed. 
Tissot  grew  weary  of  using  for  the  body  his 
gifted  brush  and  began  to  wield  it  for  the  soul. 
Thousands  upon  thousands  of  American  lads, 
frank  victims  of  the  set  of  the  materialistic 
tide,  found  themselves  caught  by  another  tide, 
in  trench  or  bivouac,  and  died  facing  the 
Eternal  City.  Belgium  found  that  she  had  a 
soul  to  answer  heroic  voices.  France  proved 
that  a  nation,  supposedly  decadent,  could  for 
a  period  of  agony,  at  least,  reverse  herself  and 
become  sacrificially  resplendent.  And  we  too, 
before  we  strike  the  rocks  toward  which  we 
are  apparently  being  borne,  must  feel  again, 
please  God,  the  pressure  of  that  "increasing 
purpose  which  through  the  ages  runs."  Speak- 
ing derisively  of  another  public  man,  a  candidate 
for  popular  suffrage  said  complacently  of  him- 
self, that  he  does  not  "hear  voices  in  the  air." 
If  it  were  true,  'tis  a  sorry  indictment.    None 


THE  "SET"  141 

who  fails  to  hear  "voices  in  the  air"  is  competent 
to  be  a  leader  of  men.  'Tis  the  "voices  in  the 
air"  that  breathe  over  the  set  of  the  tide  toward 
great  service.  There  are  such  voices  to-day, 
spite  of  commercial  clamor,  and  clattering  ma- 
terialism; august  voices,  persuasive  voices, 
heavenly  voices.  To  heed  them  and  to  yield 
ourselves  to  the  tide  they  harbinger  and  con- 
voy, is  to  have  lived  not  in  vain. 


xn 

THE  GREEN  SIGN 

I  ALMOST  trod  it  down,  and  with  no  occasion 
to  feel  self-reproached  either.  Grass  makes  a 
wonderful  carpet  as  well  as  good  fodder.  Had 
we  more  of  such  carpeting  and  fewer  warnings 
to  keep  off,  a  certain  well-advertised  rubber 
heel  would  find  its  market  narrowed.  From 
the  thudded  pavements,  or  even  the  gravelly 
path  by  the  road,  to  the  springy  turf,  what  a 
relief!  Children  are  not  alone  in  their  wish 
to  go  barefoot  when  the  sod  invites.  By  a 
sort  of  subconscious  affinity  with  the  soil  from 
whose  elements  our  bodies  are  compacted,  we 
love  the  feel  of  the  carpet  God  weaves  and  lays 
for  his  children. 

Albeit  there  has  often  fallen  upon  me  a  sort 
of  diffidence  when  crossing  lawn  or  meadow; 
a  sense  of  sacrilege  almost;  as  if  it  were  not 
fair  that  my  feet  should  break  the  stems  of 
clover  sprays  nor  crush  the  spearing  points  of 
timothy.  I  do  not  think  that  ever  wittingly 
I  trod  down  violet  or  snowflower  and  got 
away  without  wishing  there  were  time  to  go 
back   and    apologize.      I    can    perfectly    well 

142 


THE  GREEN  SIGN  143 

understand  Burns's  sparing  a  tiny  field  mouse, 
and  Tennyson  on  his  knees  before  a  flower 
in  a  crannied  wall.  Life  is  wonderful — all  of  it 
— even  when  it  assumes  unlovely  forms.  To 
take  life  away  from  any  lowly  thing  needs 
ample  warrant.  With  a  very  little  persuasion 
I  could  have  become  a  Buddhist — had  I  not 
been  a  Methodist.  Nevertheless,  I  almost 
trampled  upon  a  patch  of  thrusting  green  in 
my  path  recently.  I  do  not  yet  know  how  I 
escaped  the  profanation.  Had  my  eyes  been 
on  "higher  things,"  so  to  speak,  I  might  have 
been  denied  even  the  privilege  of  going  back 
to  apologize  for  a  heedless  step.  The  day  was 
hot  and  the  sidewalk  was  hard  and  I  had 
business.  But  just  ahead  of  me,  pushing 
bravely  skyward  from  a  shallow  break  in  the 
concrete,  was  a  little  spray  of  green.  My 
botany  was  too  rusty  to  permit  identification 
of  the  species,  but  what  matter?  It  does  not 
appear  that  Adam  was  specially  advantaged  by 
being  able  to  attach  to  every  living  thing  an 
appropriate  name.  One  sometimes  ends  by 
being  suspicious  of  too  much  classification. 
There  is  a  seductive  kind  of  infidelity,  of 
which  some  one  observes  that  the  moment 
we  discover  how  God  does  a  thing,  we  decide 
that  he  did  not  do  it.  What  caught  and  held 
me  was  the  startling  presence  of  that  wisp 


144  CROSS-LOTS 

of  brave  green  in  the  public  footway. 
Some  vagrant  spore — wafted  who  knows  from 
whence? — had  dropped  into  that  crack  in  the 
concrete  and  had  seized  the  opportunity  to 
demonstrate  its  abihty. 

One  grows  weary  sometimes  of  the  dirge 
of  the  "might  have  been";  the  threnody  of 
those  disappointed  children  of  God  who  are 
forever  listing  the  miracles  they  could  have 
wrought  and  been,  given  adequate  facilities. 
There  are,  of  course,  great  days  and  great 
occasions  on  which  God  seems  to  call  with 
unmistakable  tone.  Most  folks  do  fairly  well 
with  such  golden  opportunities.  But  the  real 
alchemist  is  the  golden  man,  who  makes  golden 
a  commonplace  chance.  Calling  the  roll  of 
the  immortals  I  am  not  so  sure  of  their  ad- 
vantage in  circumstances  as  I  am  of  their 
genius  to  make  the  most  of  any  circumstance 
however  meager.  When  Bob  Fitzsimmons  was 
asked  the  secret  of  fistic  success,  he  answered, 
laconically,  "Always  hit  from  where  your 
hand  is."  Not  in  the  long  patient  afterwhiles 
will  it  particularly  avail  us  to  describe  the 
thundering  blow  we  might  have  delivered  had 
our  hand  been  placed  just  right.  Perhaps 
General  George  B.  McClellan  was  a  wiser 
military  strategist  than  General  Grant.  The 
success  of  the  one  does  not  involve  disparage- 


THE  GREEN  SIGN  145 

ment  of  the  other.  But  McCIellan  seemed 
always  waiting  a  favorable  occasion  to  deliver 
his  great  stroke,  while  Grant's  secret  was  "hard 
pounding."  No  wonder  that  the  President 
said  of  this  quiet,  dogged  man,  when  traducers 
cried  against  him:  "I  can't  spare  him:  he 
fights."  Doubtless  "there  is  a  tide  in  the 
affairs  of  men  which,  taken  at  the  flood,  leads 
on  to  fortune."  But  the  tide,  thus  taken, 
is  not  necessarily  or  even  probably  a  spring 
or  neap  tide;  it  is  most  likely  an  ordinary 
tide,  just  such  as  creeps  quietly  up  the  beach, 
twice  a  day,  but  "taken  at  the  flood."  Medioc- 
rity waits  for  a  superior  equipment  with  which 
to  show  its  skill;  the  clever  workman  impro- 
vises a  tool  and  finishes  his  task  while  the 
other  dallies.  Some  one  says  that  a  great 
surgeon  can  open  a  skull  with  hammer  and 
chisel,  if  he  has  to.  Browning's  poetry  is  less 
musical  than  Tennyson's;  but  if  he  had  not 
the  gift  of  waiting  to  find  the  fitting  word, 
his  the  greater  gift  of  seizing  an  available 
word  and  making  it  fit  his  line.  Such  is  the 
forthrightness  of  his  work;  its  essentially  mas- 
culine quality.  He  hit  from  where  his  hand 
was.  To  do  that  always,  to  put  one's  best 
strength  into  the  blow  permitted  by  circum- 
stances, to  row  against  the  stream  of  tendency 
if  need  be,  to  grow  a  soul  in  the  thick  of  things 


146  CROSS-LOTS 

as  bravely  as  in  cloistered  safety — so  much 
my  patch  of  green  taught  me. 

Speaking  of  the  Messina  earthquake,  as  I 
recall,  and  of  the  verdure  that  appeared  on 
the  hills  and  valleys,  next  spring  after  the 
terrible  catastrophe,  Lyman  Abbott  observed 
that  "there  is  something  divine  in  the  way 
nature  clothes  with  fresh  beauty  the  scene  of 
the  old  desolations."  God  is  forever  doing 
such  things  as  that.  He  seems  not  to  wait 
to  show  his  skill;  he  shows  it  anywhere — in  a 
hot-house  where  heat  and  chill  are  tempered, 
or  in  a  tiny  patch  of  earth  where  the  pavement 
is  broken  and  passers  heed  not  the  vivid 
wonder  there  on  view. 

But  my  interest  grew  with  looking.  In  that 
precarious  garden  patch,  perhaps  four  inches 
square,  snatched  at  random  apparently,  both 
prodigality  and  economy  were  blended.  One 
fault  with  the  generous  man  is  that  his  bent 
has  no  saving  check  of  frugality,  while  his 
opposite  does  not  know  how  to  be  profuse. 
God  is  both  lavish  and  careful,  as  you  may 
learn  from  every  tree  and  meadow.  He  wastes 
nothing  that  ought  to  be  saved,  and  withholds 
naught  where  bestowment  will  bless.  That 
hillside  picture  of  a  multitude  for  whom  Jesus 
played  host  tells  the  whole  story.  Loaves 
multiplied  in  the  hands  of  our  Lord  as  bios- 


THE  GREEN  SIGN  147 

soms  on  a  cherry  tree  or  wheat  kernels  on  their 
stalk.  There  was  enough  and  to  spare.  When 
God  has  the  chance  to  be  host  no  hunger  is 
left  unappeased.  With  most  generous  folks 
that  would  have  been  the  end  of  the  story — 
and  the  fragments  might  have  lain  on  the 
ground  till  birds  gathered  or  mold  destroyed. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  nothing  would  have  been 
lost  in  either  case.  But,  for  the  purpose  of 
teaching  the  correlate  laws  of  profusion  and 
frugality,  just  as  soon  as  the  last  guest  had 
been  supplied,  his  Host  commanded:  "Gather 
up  the  fragments  that  remain,  that  nothing 
be  lost."  God  cannot  abide  waste  places. 
Every  opportunity  is  for  him  an  invitation — 
whether  in  garden  or  heart.  He  will  not  per- 
mit any  acre  of  land  to  lie  bare.  If  you  do  not 
seed  it,  he  will.  He  leaves  no  heart  untenanted. 
Let  him  find  a  vacant  room  and  he  will  fill  it. 
His  guest-friends  are  everywhere.  Isaiah's 
ecstatic  glimpse  of  the  desert  breaking  into 
bloom  is  prophetic  of  life  as  it  shall  be  when 
mortals  shall  have  gone  into  full  partnership 
with  their  Father  in  heaven.  Government 
Reclamation  Service  is  hint  of  a  still  higher 
and  more  vital  ministry.  For  every  dry  and 
dismal  patch  of  heart-soil,  for  every  undrained 
swamp  of  sorrow,  for  every  hidden  corner  that 
could  bear  a  flower  to  blush  unseen,  there  is 


148  CROSS-LOTS 

redemption  in  the  program  of  God.     Nothing 
wasted  and  nothing  needful  denied. 

I  recall  a  soldierly-looking,  stalwart  man 
whom  I  sometimes  thought  penurious,  he  was 
so  exceedingly  careful  of  the  dimes.  He  was 
an  ardent  believer  in  celluloid  collars,  as  saving 
laundry  bills;  and  he  never  countenanced 
throwing  a  pair  of  shoe  strings  away  merely 
because  one  of  them  broke.  He  nettled  me. 
I  vowed  that  if  ever  I  drew  a  salary  as  large 
as  his,  I  would  not  be  so  stingy.  Perhaps  it 
may  be  said  with  truth  that  I've  lived  up  to 
my  threat.  I've  not  scamped  the  pennies  as 
he  did.  Nor  have  I  made  the  princely  gifts 
that  set  his  face  ashine.  Being  less  frugal 
than  he,  I  had  to  content  myself  with  giving 
less  lavishly.  In  the  souls  that  are  most  god- 
like the  two  are  conjoined — frugality  and 
largess.  God  saves  raindrops  that  he  may 
send  showers.  He  gathers  up  every  falling 
leaf  in  the  interest  of  next  year's  harvest.  He 
conserves  that  he  may  spend  in  beauty  and 
power.  God  denied  Beethoven  the  ordinary 
blessing  of  hearing,  and  then  made  him  one  of 
the  hierarchs  of  harmony.  He  withheld  physi- 
cal health  from  Robert  Southey,  and  for 
recompense  gave  him  a  ministry  of  soul-healing 
for  multitudes.  He  declined  to  answer  Paul's 
prayer  for  the  removal  of  a  thorn  in  the  flesh, 


THE  GREEN  SIGN  149 

and  let  him  lead  the  hope  of  a  race.  He  re- 
fused to  spare  Jesus  the  cup  of  bitterness,  and 
dowered  him  with  a  "name  that  is  above 
every  name." 

But  my  tiny  spray  of  green  in  the  footway 
taught  me  one  thing  more.  It  suggested  the 
everlasting  rebirth  of  hope.  It  was  alive;  it 
was  growing;  crushed  by  an  unwary  or  cruel 
heel,  it  would  poke  up  a  fresh  blade  next 
morning.  Such  was  its  advantage  over  the 
noblest  monument  reared  by  hands.  From  the 
river  front  of  a  teeming  city  I  caught  sight  of 
the  tallest  building  in  the  world.  Immense 
yet  almost  incredibly  graceful,  set  like  a  hill 
on  vast  foundations,  and  lifting  a  gold-spattered 
head  above  its  neighbors,  it  well  memorializes 
the  spirit  of  the  merchant  whose  name  it  bears. 
But  it  is  3i  finished  thing.  When  the  last  marble 
slab  was  set,  the  last  doorknob  in  place,  the 
building  was  done.  It  is  memory  rather  than 
prophecy.  It  suggests  naught  more  than  eye 
can  see.  Conceivably  it  might  be  rebuilt:  it 
never  could  be  reborn.  Whereas  the  palest, 
shyest  shoot  of  living  green,  thrusting  its  un- 
daunted way  upward  from  a  thimbleful  of 
stray  soil  in  the  pavement,  is  a  promise,  a 
pledge  of  greater  things  to  be. 

Thus  life  is  evennore  surprising  and  hearten- 
ing us  with  fresh  rebirths  of  hope.    Hope  will 


150  CROSS-LOTS 

grow  in  the  unlikeliest  chinks  and  crevices  of 
a  hard  journey.    It  requires  less  soil  than  any 
other  seed  dropped  out  of  heaven.     It  is  next 
to  impossible  to  kill.     Taking  the  cue  from  a 
famous  Pauline  apotheosis,  Henry  Drummond 
named  love  as  "The  Greatest  Thing  in  the 
World" — greater  than  faith,  greater  than  hope. 
Greater    doubtless,    but    not    as    resistant    of 
death.     Hope  smolders  in  the  ashes  of  love. 
In  the  process  of  dismantling  a  room  in  which 
one  has  lived,  the  hardest  moment  is  when  the 
portraits  come  down.     One  by  one  they  slip 
from  their  places  on  wall  or  mantel-place — 
face  of  friend,  face  of  lover,  face  of  child,  each 
with  its  special  pang.     Always,  by  the  law  of 
numbers,  one  face  must  disappear  last.     And 
the  last  to  go  is  the  face  which,  more  than 
all   others,   glorified   the   room    and   made   it 
home.     When  that  face  has  gone  the  room  is 
merely  an  empty,  echoing  place.    So  when  the 
face  of  hope  disappears  from  the  house  of  life. 
Always  hope  is  the  last  to  fade.     And  with 
the  passing  of  hope  the  house  is  stripped  and 
ghostly.    Nothing  remains  save  for  the  tenant 
to  move  out,  as  many  such  an  one  has  done 
by    self-destruction.      Every    suicide,    by    his 
desperate  deed,  confesses  that  hope  is  dead. 
"We  are  saved  by  hope":  saved  from  arctic 
isolation,  saved  from  corrosive  bitterness,  saved 


THE  GREEN  SIGN  151 

from  utter  despair.  Times  come  when  the 
only  salvation  left  is  to  drop  into  some  tiny 
patch  of  hospitable  heart-soil  a  seed  of  hope. 
Indeed,  the  only  salvation  worthy  the  name  is 
rainbowed  and  effervescent  with  hope.  Not  by 
accident  comes  it  that  the  most  hopeful  and 
hope-begetting  Man  of  the  ages  became  the 
world's  Redeemer.  None  other  could.  Through 
all  the  music  of  his  ministry  to  pain  and  sin 
sounds  the  dominant  note  of  hope. 

The  green  sign  in  the  hard  pavements  where 
feet  fall  laggard — sometimes  it  is  the  hope 
of  success  following  repeated  failures.  You 
must  rewrite  history  if  you  dare  omit  from 
calculation  the  ministry  of  hope.  Tours  was  a 
last  ditch  for  Europe  against  the  victorious 
Saracen.  But  Tours  was  a  battle  of  hope,  not 
of  despair.  Suppose  the  spirit  of  Charles 
Martel  had  offered  no  soil  to  the  seed  of  hope.?^ 
Tradition  gives  credit  to  a  spider  for  dropping 
into  the  heart  of  Robert  Bruce  the  vital  pledge 
of  victory.  "Our  back  against  the  wall," 
was  Haig's  summary  of  Britain's  plight  in  the 
black  summer  days  of  1918 — and  the  civilized 
world  gasped  for  breath.  Morning  broke  be- 
cause desperation  was  streaked  red  with  hope. 
Hope  won.  Most  of  the  immortals  failed  more 
times  than  they  succeeded.  Grant,  Gough, 
Seneca,    Stephen,    Ericsson,    Edison,    Calvin, 


152  CROSS-LOTS 

Cranmer,  Luther,  Lincoln,  Justin  Martyr, 
Jesus — call  the  roll  as  you  will.  They  tri- 
umphed because  hope  was  reborn  once  more 
than  it  died  in  their  breasts.  Nothing  else 
succeeds  as  well  as  a  wisely  turned  failure  when 
hope  beacons  forward.  Somewhere  on  the  hard 
road  of  the  day's  work,  in  a  crevice  between 
the  stones,  perhaps,  God  is  sure  to  set  a  gar- 
den, however  tiny,  greening  with  promise.  To 
miss  sight  of  that  spray  of  green  is  failure. 

So  for  the  heart.  The  heart's  hope  is  love. 
She  was  only  a  kitchen  drudge,  as  most  would 
say;  though  I  recall  with  delight  her  hot 
biscuits  and  her  cookies  and  her  maple-sugar 
pie.  (Never  heard  of  the  latter?  Then  you 
have  missed  a  dainty  fit  for  the  gods.)  And 
I  suppose  that  the  hours  in  the  kitchen  were 
pitilessly  long  and  the  monotony  deadening. 
That  was  before  the  days  of  domestic  Bol- 
shevism. Yet  somewhat  saved  Clara  from 
being  a  drudge.  She  never  expected  to  end 
her  days  in  a  kitchen.  Hope  saved  her  at 
twenty,  at  forty,  at  sixty.  She  never  gave  up 
the  hope  of  love  and  a  home  of  her  own.  If 
the  letter-carrier  tarried  a  moment  beyond  the 
need  of  the  case,  and  we  teased  her  about 
him,  the  dear,  kind  face  went  fairly  radiant 
with  hope.  If  the  grocer's  clerk  or  the  gas- 
meter  man  seemed  to  delay  after  his  errand, 


THE  GREEN  SIGN  153 

I  am  sure  she  heard  love  knocking  at  the  door. 
She  may  have  been  sixty  when,  one  day,  she 
confessed,  with  a  strange  pucker  of  lips,  "Well, 
I  suppose — ."  Oh  no!  she  did  nothing  of  the 
sort.  Hope  was  not  so  piquant,  but  it  still 
lived.  I  do  not  think  she  ever  gave  up  hope. 
And  at  last  she  fell  asleep — dreaming  of  love 
perhaps.  'Tis  the  hope  of  love  keeps  the 
heart  alive;  hope  of  a  mighty,  transfiguring 
love.  Love  of  friend,  love  of  little  children, 
love  of  mate — the  hope  of  love!  "The  light 
of  the  whole  life  dies  when  love  is  gone" — or 
the  hope  of  it.  One  can  subsist  for  a  long 
time  on  the  dry  bread  of  drudgery,  or,  in  turn, 
decline  the  highly  spiced  menu  of  ignoble  pas- 
sion, while  the  heart  still  holds  hope  of  a 
sacramental  meal.  God  be  thanked,  then,  for 
the  smallest  spear  of  green  in  the  footway  as 
suggesting  the  joy  of  harvest  for  the  heart. 

So  with  the  paramount  business  of  a  man. 
The  real  birthright  of  humankind  is  goodness. 
Even  though  he  barter  it  for  a  mess  of  por- 
ridge, still  he  remembers  that  it  was  his  birth- 
right, and  dreams  that  he  has  not  quite  for- 
feited it.  Most  of  our  laborious  self -justification 
for  being  what  we  doubtless  are  begs  the 
question  of  a  different  calling.  If  folks  were 
satisfied  with  themselves,  they  would  quit 
explaining.     We  do  not  read  that  the  swine 


154  CROSS-LOTS 

of  the  "far  country"  protested  against  husks. 
Such  was  their  normal  provender.  But  the 
swineherd  had  memories.  In  a  sanctifying 
sense  he  felt  "above  his  job,"  and  particularly 
above  his  fare.  Somewhere  on  the  hard  path 
of  transgression  a  seed  found  space  to  sprout 
and  grow.  And  that  seed  was  hope.  Hope 
brought  him  home,  hope  of  being  all  he  had 
been  at  his  best,  and  somewhat  more  for  the 
bitter  lesson  he  had  learned.  I  do  not  think 
he  expected  to  be  made  a  hired  servant,  once 
he  got  home.  That  was  all  he  planned  to  ask, 
but  he  never  asked  it.  By  the  time  he  had  a 
chance  to  look  into  his  father's  face,  hope  had 
grown.  But  I  am  thinking  of  the  days  before 
hope  had  grown,  when  it  was  merely  a  spray 
of  green  in  the  footway.  Can  it  be  that  any 
man  is  denied  that.?  Lives  there  a  man  with 
soul  so  dead  that  it  offers  no  hospitahty  at  all 
to  the  kingdom-seed  of  hope?  Is  ever  the 
pavement  altogether  unbroken.?  The  tragedy  is 
that  the  traveler  cannot  or  will  not  believe 
the  harbinger  God  drops  into  the  path. 


xm 

AGAINST  THE  SUN 

I  WAKENED  just  in  time.  Five  minutes  more 
sleep  would  have  cost  me  the  divine  surprise 
of  my  eastern  window.  Judging  by  the  tenac- 
ity with  which  my  memory  holds  the  event, 
I  could  not  afford  to  miss  it.  And  as  I  rubbed 
my  eyes  I  thanked  my  God  that  my  window 
opened  eastward.  Folks  are  who  cannot  abide 
such  orientation.  They  dislike  the  storm- 
winds  that  besiege,  and  the  rattling  sash.  They 
cry  against  the  occasional  gray  where  one 
normally  expects  crimson  and  gold.  They  hate 
the  chill  of  that  side  of  the  house.  Any  except 
an  east  window  for  them.  Whereas,  for  me, 
by  all  means  a  casement  that  opens  toward 
morning.  God  has  few  other  caresses  like  the 
one  he  drops  on  your  face  as  the  sun  climbs 
again.  One  may  sleep  through  it,  of  course, 
if  he  choose — and  can.  He  may  draw  a  green 
shade  to  escape  the  caress.  He  may  turn  away 
a  sleepy  face,  or  blink  petulantly.  And  still, 
with  that  celestial  persistence,  in  practice  of 
which  God  is  forever  wearing  down  opposition 
and  making  bad  people  good,  he  continues  to 

155 


156  CROSS-LOTS 

perpetrate  the  sunrise  marvel.  Every  man  to 
his  taste,  and  mine  for  me.  Mine  includes  a 
window  through  which,  if  I  so  elect,  in  tonic 
ecstasy  I  may  see  rosy-fingered  morn  stand 
tiptoe. 

'Twas  sun-up.  And  it  may  be  said  that, 
first  and  last,  I've  witnessed  many  such  a 
glory.  I've  seen  the  winter  sun  set  snow-clad 
fields  ashine  with  cold  splendor,  and  the  spring 
sun  turn  to  Golconda  mines,  exploded  broad- 
cast, the  most  commonplace  meadow.  I've 
watched  a  bright  red  disc  roll  up  through  grim 
tapestries  of  cloud,  fighting  silently  for  mas- 
tery. I've  glimpsed  both  havoc  and  harvest 
in  the  clean,  fresh  light  of  the  morning  after. 
I've  experienced  sunrises  that  seemed  piteously 
tardy,  and  sunrises  that  were  pitilessly  prompt. 
But  never  another  precisely  like  the  one  that 
startled  me  one  recent  morning.  'Twas  sun- 
rise— plus. 

Which  constitutes  my  apology  for  taking 
space  to  describe  it.  What  wakened  me  in 
the  nick  of  time  I  cannot  say.  Some  sub- 
liminal consciousness,  perhaps,  of  the  lesson 
I  should  have  missed  by  sleeping  through  it. 
'Twas  broad  day,  if  early.  His  solar  majesty 
had  been  on  the  throne  again  a  half  hour  or 
such  a  matter.  Yonder  he  shone,  crimson- 
garmented,    full-disced,    not   too   dazzling   for 


AGAINST  THE  SUN  157 

ordinary  vision.  But  what? — and  I  sat  bolt 
upright.  Against  the  broad  orb  was  a  figure 
as  perfectly  centered  as  if  stamped  on  a  coin. 
Often  and  half  sheepishly  had  I  looked  for  the 
"man  in  the  moon,"  never  for  "the  man  in 
the  sun.'*  Nor  was  I  looking  for  him  then, 
Germany  having  failed  of  the  place  she  de- 
manded. Yet  there  he  stood,  to  be  seen  of 
me,  if  not  of  the  rest  of  mankind.  And  I 
rubbed  my  eyes  again.  Fortunately  I  found 
my  wits  before  the  wonder  passed.  And,  in 
a  way,  it  was  no  wonder  at  all.  The  figure 
silhouetted  against  the  sun  was  Washington's, 
his  famous  monumental  image  based  with  a 
hundred  odd  feet  of  stone.  I  had  seen  the 
brave  statue  at  noonday,  by  moonlight;  dimly 
through  fog  and  vivid  against  a  blue  ground, 
gazing  off  toward  the  quiet  eternities  rather 
than  downward  for  the  cheap  applauses  of 
men.  But  never  before  or  since  had  I  seen 
Washington  against  the  sun. 

One  must  admit,  of  course,  the  transiency 
of  the  apparition.  Let  me  change  my  window, 
or  the  sun  mount  a  trifle  higher,  or  fog  roll 
up  from  the  Bay,  and  my  symbol  would  be 
gone — was  gone  in  less  time  than  it  takes  me 
to  tell  about  it.  Even  so  I  had  caught  a  new 
glimpse  of  George  Washington.  For  a  moment 
I  had  seen  him  framed  against  the  sun — safe 


158  CROSS-LOTS 

and  serene.  Not  in  all  the  histories,  or  on  all 
the  bronzes,  or  in  sculptured  effigies,  can  you 
find  another  tribute  quite  so  fine.  To  stand 
clear  cut,  forthright,  and  unashamed  against 
the  sun  is  fame  enough  for  the  ages.  On  a 
burning  page  of  an  old  volume  is  this  strange 
description  of  a  worthful  life;  "Worthy  to 
stand  before  the  Son  of  Man.'*  As  compared 
with  distinctions  of  tinsel,  glare,  and  pageant, 
this  seems  uninvitingly  tame;  to  be  able,  at 
the  crest,  to  "stand  before"  the  least  ostenta- 
tious, most  self-forgetting  Man  of  the  ages. 
But  I  am  thinking  of  manhood — sheer  man- 
hood— not  artistic  eminence  or  plutocratic 
power  or  pomp  of  office.  After  all,  there  is 
but  one  scale  of  measure  for  manhood.  Stripped 
of  regalia,  unpropped  by  fears  and  conventions, 
sized  in  soul,  how  much  of  a  man  is  my  friend 
or  my  candidate  for  office.''  Most  humans 
shrink  woefully,  gauged  even  as  Bobbie  Burns 
rated  them.  What  when  the  Man  of  Nazareth 
is  appraiser .'^  His  is  the  ultimate  analysis. 
And  to  stand  before  him,  as  Raphael  stood 
before  Angelo;  as  William  Hohenzollem  stood 
before  Frederick  the  Great;  as  Saint  Francis 
stood  before  the  Man  of  the  Nail  Prints,  is 
the  crowning  test. 

In  terms  not   dissimilar  I   thought  of  the 
figure  against  the  sun.    History  gives  the  story 


AGAINST  THE  SUN  159 

of  his  battles.  Biographers  have  stirred  the 
cold  ashes  of  his  personal  life.  Portrait  painters 
have  made  his  features  familiar  to  the  world. 
But  to  have  the  morning  sun  as  luminous 
background;  to  stand,  heroic  size,  in  the  proud 
quiet  dignity  of  manhood,  is  more  than  to 
be  vanquisher  of  Cornwallis,  or  Chief  Citizen 
of  the  new  republic.  To  use  her  own  language, 
all  that  Germany  asked  was  "a  place  in  the 
sun."  With  ingenuity  almost  incredible  and 
with  patience  satanic,  she  arranged  the  scenario 
for  such  a  drama  of  human  arrogance  as,  please 
God,  the  world  never  again  may  be  com- 
pelled to  behold.  Had  Germany  won  the  place 
she  fought  for,  we  must  have  set  back  the 
shadow  on  the  dial  of  Jesus  two  thousand  years. 
But  the  place  in  the  sun  is  not  grabbed:  it 
is  given.  None  can  take  it  by  force,  as  the 
Saracen  took  Constantinople  or  the  Romanoffs 
took  Poland,  or  as  the  ordinary  coveter  takes 
whatever  he  lusts  for,  providing  he  can  get  it. 
We  spend  so  preponderant  a  part  of  life  strain- 
ing and  sweating  for  "recognition"  as  we  call 
it.  One  might  fancy  that  the  chief  advantage 
of  a  good  deed  were  the  fame  thereof.  Who, 
in  truth,  can  name  in  advance  his  real  claim 
to  immortality  of  grateful  remembrance?  What 
some  one  calls  "The  Surprises  of  the  Judgment,'* 
as  referring   to  a  future   Assize,   might   with 


160  CROSS-LOTS 

equal   pertinence   be   applied   to   the   world's 
calm  judgment  on  the  lives  of  men.     Seldom, 
perhaps,  is  a  man  remembered  for  his  most 
conscious  sacrifices.     Mascagni's  now  familiar 
"Intermezzo,"  then  a  musical  stray  that  barely 
escaped  the  waste-basket,  redeemed  the  entire 
opera  of  Cavalleria  Rusticana  to  popularity, 
and  assured  its  composer's  fame.     Who  but 
God   would  have  picked  the  hastily   written 
lines  of  Lincoln's  Gettysburg  Address  to  rank 
among  the  world's  deathless  classics?    Looking 
back    across    the   battlefields   and    diplomatic 
maneuvers  of  his  dramatic  career,  Napoleon 
named,  for  joy  of  remembrance,  not  Austerlitz 
nor    Jena   but    the    Orphans'    Home   he   had 
founded  "somewhere  in  France."     Bernard  of 
Cluny,  theologian  and  controversialist,  might 
be  forgotten  to-day  save  for  his  "Jerusalem  the 
Golden"  dropped  into  the  hjTunology  of  the 
church.    The  most  Christly  gift  of  Stephen  to 
mankind  was  not  the  fiery  speech  which  cost 
him  his  life,   but   the   unconscious   shining   of 
his  face  as  the  stones   rained   upon  him,  and 
his  gasp  of  a  prayer,  "Lord,  lay  not  this  sin 
to  their  charge."    If  I  had  to  name  the  divinest 
marks  of  our  Lord,  I  should  reverently  recall 
those  least  premeditated   sayings   and  minis- 
tries which  burst  upon   the  world  gently   as 
buds  into  blooming.    You  cannot  use  the  same 


AGAINST  THE  SUN  161 

scales  for  sacks  of  meal  and  sapphires.  The 
wise  jeweler  does  not  try.  The  "Fairbanks" 
that  weighs  out  his  corn  will  miss  the  weight 
of  his  gem.  Real  greatness — the  greatness  that 
sets  its  possessor  against  the  sun — is  never  a 
thing  of  bulk  and  longitude.  It  is  an  essence: 
and  you  may  detect  it  oftenest  in  swift  motions 
of  soul,  in  silent  outflows  of  sympathy,  in 
white  flashes  of  personalized  truth.  I  cannot 
imagine  the  man  of  Valley  Forge  and  York- 
town  as  posing  or  candidating  for  a  place  in 
the  sun.  He  wist  not  the  glory  that  oncoming 
ages  would  see  in  his  face.  He  did  big  deeds 
and  bore  his  pain  and  kept  his  faith;  leaving 
to  others  the  assignment  of  his  right  to  a  seat 
among  the  mighty. 

But  the  figure  silhouetted  against  the  sun, 
that  early  morning,  suggested  other  things.  I 
could  but  notice  that  the  face  showed  a  profile. 
As  if  unconscious  both  of  background  and 
spectator,  the  eyes  were  averted.  I  do  not 
recall,  if,  indeed,  I  ever  heard,  why  the  figure 
faces  south.  Doubtless  the  architect  had  his 
reason,  as  had  the  builders  of  Beecher's  statue 
in  Brooklyn,  fronting  the  Courthouse  in  which 
he  stood  trial  for  his  good  name;  as  the  erectors 
of  Greeley's  bronze  replica  in  "Newspaper 
Row."  I  make  sure  that  if  Hindenburg's 
famous  image  had  been  set  against  the  sun. 


162  CROSS-LOTS 

or  some  sculptured  similitude  of  the  Kaiser, 
the  eyes  would  have  faced  eastward,  as  in 
challenge  to  the  solar  majesty.  Such  was  the 
spirit  which  launched  and  prosecuted  the  most 
diabolic  enterprise  ever  devised  against  the 
liberties  and  sanctities  of  the  race.  The  super- 
man defies  the  sun  or  counts  it  a  mere  satellite 
of  his  reign.  Impudicity  everywhere  is  the 
same,  in  fashion,  in  business,  in  diplomacy. 
And,  in  the  issue,  the  sun  glazes  the  eyes  that 
stare  at  it. 

My  figure  against  the  sun  was  different  that 
radiant  morning.  The  gaze  was  turned  stead- 
fastly southward — toward  a  certain  birthplace 
on  the  Potomac,  or  a  shrined  spot  called  Mount 
Vernon?  As  if,  now  that  war  was  past  and 
the  burdens  of  office  laid  aside,  the  eyes  con- 
fessed the  instinctive  motion  of  his  heart — 
homeward.  Pity  the  Bohemian  with  his 
homing  impulse  gone.  Mortal  malady  has  be- 
fallen the  man  or  woman  who,  in  the  great 
moments  of  life,  as  in  their  aftermath,  does 
not  secretly  hunger  for  the  homeland.  On  his 
return  from  a  visit  with  Thomas  Carlyle,  John 
Burroughs  wrote  that  "a  sort  of  homesickness 
of  the  soul  was  upon  him,  and  it  deepened 
with  age."  If  proof  were  needed  of  the  fellow- 
ship with  us,  in  all  human  things,  of  the  canny 
Scot,    his    homesickness    furnishes    it.      "Ah, 


AGAINST  THE  SUN  163 

mother,"  he  wrote  in  his  diary,  to  the  woman 
long  since  missing  from  his  Hfe;  ^'youT  boy 
Tom  has  fallen  very  weary  and  forlorn."  Had 
I  my  way,  I  would  subject  every  grown-up 
to  an  attack  of  nostalgia  now  and  again — so  I 
should  help  save  to  him  his  dreams  and  ideals. 
None  are  lost  to  truth  and  honor,  whatever 
their  declensions  and  low  compromises,  so  long 
as  home  tugs  at  the  heart.  When  the  prodigal 
among  the  swineherds  began  to  be  homesick, 
amendment  had  set  in.  Let  the  boy  away  at 
school  or  in  camp  carry  in  his  eyes,  some  days, 
the  far-away,  telltale  look.  He  will  be  safer 
thus;  and  bring  home,  next  time,  less  whereof 
to  be  ashamed.  Leave  in  the  souls  of  men  an 
old-fashioned  longing  for  the  father's  table 
and  the  dear  reunions.  Is  heaven  less  real 
than  formerly?  So  much  more's  the  pity.  God 
has  been  able  to  use,  for  countless  redemptions, 
a  deep  homesickness  of  the  soul.  In  propor- 
tion as  materialism  narrows  our  citizenship  to 
one  world,  it  renders  us  less  desirable  citizens 
of  this  world. 

The  sun  has  long  ceased  to  background  for 
me  the  famous  statue.  I  have  never  caught 
the  vision  again,  but  my  heart  holds  the 
memory:  a  man  framed  against  the  sun,  in  all 
modesty  as  well  as  honor — and  his  eyes  seek- 
ing homeward. 


XIV 
THE  OLD  COVERED  BRIDGE 

From  the  bank  of  the  Susquehanna  I  noticed 
it  as  the  train  wound  its  way  up  the  river. 
With  a  host  of  memories  reaching  almost  as 
far  as  my  memory  goes,  and  tinged  with  the 
rose-and-gold  of  childhood  days,  I  studied  it 
hungrily.  I  cannot  be  sure  that  I  had  seen  it 
before,  yet  was  it  so  like  many  similar  struc- 
tures I  recall,  with  their  answering  creaks  and 
echoing  voices  and  vistas  of  light  at  the  end, 
I  hailed  it  as  an  old  friend.  It  was  longer 
perhaps,  but  in  every  essential  it  belonged  to 
the  family.  And  as  the  train  drew  past,  on 
the  bank  of  the  river,  I  watched  eagerly  for 
the  glimpse  of  the  other  shore  through  the 
barnlike  structure. 

Nowadays,  they  do  not  build  bridges  thus. 
Ours  is  the  "iron  age,"  for  bridges  as  for  many 
other  things.  And  the  "iron  age"  is  far  from 
the  "golden  age"  of  the  heart.  Of  course,  one 
must  sacrifice  something  to  security  and  perma- 
nence and  all  that.  Steel  spans  are  doubtless 
far  safer  than  the  old-fashioned  hunching 
arches  of  wood.     And  flooring  of  concrete  or 

164 


THE  OLD  COVERED  BRIDGE         165 

brick  is,  in  its  way,  vast  improvement  upon 
the  rattling  timbers  that  sometimes  cm*led  at 
the  ends  and  always  banged  joyously.  I 
admit  all  that,  as  one  should.  Yet,  for  the 
moment,  I  am  thinking  of  what  the  modern 
bridge  has  lost  that  the  old  bridge  had.  Some- 
times one  cannot  prevent  his  heart  from  cry- 
ing for  bygone  glories,  even  while  his  head 
is  congratulating  him  upon  the  more  solid 
advantages  of  our  modem  day. 

Not  long  after  the  train  ride  referred  to, 
our  steamer  was  passing  under  three  famous 
aerial  structures  by  which  Manhattan  reaches 
hands  across  the  East  River  to  Brooklyn.  It 
was  early  morning,  and  the  traffic  tide  had 
begun  to  move  overhead.  Such  a  strident 
hum  and  clatter  of  iron  as  of  a  huge  foundry 
in  the  air.  Trolleys  in  relays,  trucks  by 
platoons,  scudding  automobiles — and  foot  pas- 
sengers too,  if  one  had  field  glasses  to  pick 
them  out.  It  was  very  wonderful  of  course. 
I  suppose  that  my  grandsire,  whose  farm  ended 
at  an  old  covered  bridge,  would  have  had 
nightmares  of  wonder  and  terror.  Yet,  by 
some  strange  perversity  of  human  nature,  my 
heart  went  back  to  the  old  creaking  bridge  by 
his  gate.  I  can  shut  my  eyes  and  see  every 
timber  in  it,  almost.  I  can  smell  the  charac- 
teristic odor  of  it,  and  hear  again  the  sound 


166  CROSS-LOTS 

of  hoofs,  like  oncoming  regiments,  as  a  farm 
wagon  passed  over.  And,  then,  the  hours 
spent  in  its  shadow,  dreaming  a  boy's  day- 
dreams, and  fishing  fruitlessly  but  always  in 
hope.  And,  best  of  all,  the  glimpse  through 
the  tunnellike  shed,  at  the  trees  and  sky  be- 
yond. First  and  last,  I  have  seen  a  good  many 
of  the  world's  famous  bridges;  Niagara,  of 
course;  the  Clyde,  the  Firth  of  Forth,  London, 
Paris,  Quebec.  I  have  paid  the  toll  and  the 
just  meed  of  wonder.  Mechanical  science  does 
startling  things.  But  draftsmen  and  me- 
chanics cannot  build  a  bridge  that  I  love  as  I 
loved  the  old  covered  bridge  across  the  Onion 
River,  close  by  grandfather's  farm. 

One  day  I  went  back  to  the  village  among 
the  hills,  questing  the  dear  trysting  places,  and 
I  did  not  even  know  when  I  arrived.  The  old 
creaking  bridge  had  localized  everything  for 
me.  And  the  old  weather-worn  structure  was 
gone.  Prosperity  and  modernity  had  sacrificed 
it — with  acclaim,  I  suppose.  And  in  its  place 
stood  a  solid  affair  of  steel  and  concrete, 
adequate  to  any  load  of  granite,  and  minus  all 
echoes.  Whereas  its  predecessor  had  answered 
deliciously  my  footfalls  and  shouts,  this  new 
thing  seemed  coldly  oblivious.  And  the  chill  at 
my  heart  matched  the  coolnessof  the  steel  girders. 

Stupid,  of  course,  and  altogether  reactionary. 


THE  OLD  COVERED  BRIDGE         167 

for  one  who  enjoys  the  comforts  and  equip- 
ments of  modernity,  to  complain  because  an 
outgrown  building  had  been  relegated  to  its 
inevitable  limbo.  I  do  not  mean  to  be  un- 
generous toward  the  spirit  of  science.  Incal- 
culable is  the  debt  we  owe  to  the  inventor  and 
his  collaborators.  No  sane  man  wants  to  go 
back  to  the  age  before  telephones  and  steel 
coaches,  trolleys  and  elevators,  automobiles  and 
wireless.  Even  if  we  fail  to  live  longer  and  more 
happily  for  use  of  a  thousand  conveniences, 
we  doubtless  die  with  fewer  wrinkles.  All  one 
need  say,  all  he  ought  to  say,  is  that  our  ma- 
terial gains  are  partly  offset  by  spiritual  losses. 
It  is  a  little  harder  to  keep  dreams  alive  in 
the  neighborhood  of  so  much  modernity.  Some 
very  precious  possessions  have  flown  out  at 
the  window  while  obvious  advantages  were 
coming  through  the  door.  I  do  not  believe 
that  the  most  approved  drinking  faucet  can 
substitute,  to  the  heart  of  a  man,  for  the  old 
oaken  bucket  that  hung  in  the  well.  And  I 
question  if  the  most  luxurious  box  spring  mat- 
tress ever  makes  quite  so  sweet  a  bed  as  did 
the  haymow.  At  any  rate,  the  heart  goes 
lonesome  occasionally  for  the  things  we  lost 
while  we  were  being  enriched  and  convenienced 
in  so  many  brilliant  ways — the  forfeitures  of 
our  modernity. 


168  CROSS-LOTS 

Despite  its  archaisms  and  general  shakiness, 
the  old  covered  bridge  had  its  unique  ad- 
vantages. For  one,  it  was  "homemade." 
Tradition  said  that  villagers  had  hewn  the  wood 
and  driven  the  spikes.  It  was  not  simply  a 
bridge,  as  to  the  imported  bridge-builders  who 
came  to  earn  their  wages  and  pass  on:  it  was 
for  its  artisans  the  way  to  the  post  office  or 
the  smithy's  or  church.  Love  of  home  went 
into  it,  and  village  pride  and  many  memories. 
It  was  peculiarly  their  bridge  for  many  who 
traversed  it.  Of  course  you  cannot  set  such 
items  in  a  ledger — more's  the  pity.  Neither 
can  you  Hve  richly  without  them.  The  truest 
possession  is  never  bought  save  in  the  coin  of 
the  heart.  Ordinarily,  love  grows  with  cost — 
specially  the  cost  of  service  and  self-denial. 
No  one  is  expected  to  love  the  municipal  im- 
provement he  helps  pay  for  with  his  taxes; 
but  when  he  puts  himself  into  the  betterment 
love  hallows  it.  I  have  watched  children  turn 
from  expensive  toys  to  a  plaything  of  their 
own  construction.  Of  course.  'Tis  the  creator's 
love  for  his  own  handiwork.  What  I  build 
is  mine  with  an  indefeasible  right.  I  love  it 
as  a  piece  of  self -interpretation.  What  factory 
hand  loves  his  place  of  employment  as  the 
village  blacksmith  loves  his  own  forge,  or 
the    artist    his    studio?     Always  between  the 


THE  OLD  COVERED  BRIDGE         169 

manufacturer  and  the  creator  is  a  great  gulf 
fixed.  To  say  nothing  of  the  profanation  of  it, 
consider  merely  the  insanity  of  the  socialist's 
plan  to  raise  children  in  creches,  wholesale. 
John  Fiske  thought  he  found,  in  the  lengthened 
period  of  infancy  for  the  human  offspring  the 
deep  root  of  self-sacrifice.  Cut  that  root  and 
what  kind  of  blossoms  may  be  expected? 
Without  the  prodigal  investment  of  mother- 
hood, protracted  through  weary  years,  you 
shall  not  often  have  a  John  Quincy  Adams 
or  an  Abraham  Lincoln,  a  John  Wesley  or  a 
Phillips  Brooks.  All  best  work  is  love  work. 
And  for  its  heart-value  to  the  community, 
I'd  rather  have  the  old  covered  bridge,  built 
by  eager,  affectionate  hands,  than  the  most 
approved  structure  that  modern  mechanicians 
can  plan  and  farm  out  to  hired  hands,  for 
wages  merely.  That's  the  way  my  heart 
feels  about  it;  and  if  my  head  disagrees,  so 
much  the  worse  for  my  head.  In  any  event, 
I  am  likely  to  do  most  of  my  river-crossing  on 
steel  bridges. 

But  the  old  wooden  bridge  was  covered. 
I  do  not  precisely  know  why.  Nothing  in  the 
history  of  such  structures  seemed  to  involve 
a  covering.  The  shed  adds  nothing  to  the 
strength — nor  to  the  beauty.  But  to  my 
fancy   the   tunnel-like   form   suggests   several 


170  CROSS-LOTS 

things.  At  the  least  you  knew  that  you  were 
crossing  a  river.  Nowadays,  you  may  drive 
your  automobile  across  one  of  these  modern 
concrete-floored,  steel  bridges,  without  being 
conscious  that  you  have  left  terra  firma.  Not 
so  with  the  old  wooden  bridge.  It  loomed 
in  your  road,  shadowy  and  a  trifle  awesome. 
Very  sharply  it  delimited  land  and  water. 
And  the  instant  you  passed  its  wide  portal, 
you  were  shut  in  from  the  world — and  the 
swirling  waters  beneath.  Sometimes  there 
were  windows:  most  times  not.  Usually,  you 
had  nothing  save  the  gloom,  and  the  arch  of 
daylight  ahead.  Was  the  purpose  of  the  cover- 
ing to  accent  the  sense  of  peril  or  to  lessen  it 
by  withholding  your  eyes  from  the  torrent 
below.''  I  think  it  did  both.  We  learn  to 
take  too  much  for  granted — sunrises  and  har- 
vests, health  and  friends.  Without  just  recog- 
nition of  the  hazards  involved,  we  launch  upon 
uncharted  seas.  We  trust  our  lives  daily,  un- 
heeding and  unthanking.  And  we  lose  the 
wonder  because  deliverance  is  the  usual  issue. 
To  say  that  a  man  is  not  afraid  of  anything 
is  dubious  compliment.  Fear  plays  an  indis- 
pensable part  in  the  economy  of  God.  The 
hen  is  always  afraid  of  the  hawk.  The  wise 
mariner  is  always  afraid  of  rocks  and  ice- 
bergs.   The  saint  is  always  afraid  of  sin.    There 


THE  OLD  COVERED  BRIDGE         171 

would  be  fewer  moral  tragedies  to  record  if 
folks  were  more  keenly  sensitive  to  fear  in  its 
protective  aspects.  Recklessness  lands  its 
possessor  nowhere  except  in  perdition.  In  one 
aspect  the  Bible  is  a  book  of  cautionary  signals. 
From  cover  to  cover  it  sounds  a  note  of  warn- 
ing. Frankly  it  says  that  a  certain  kind  of 
fear  is  the  "beginning  of  wisdom."  And  He 
who  counseled  so  persuasively,  "Be  not  afraid," 
warned  also,  "I  will  tell  you  of  whom  ye  shall 
be  afraid." 

But  the  covering  of  the  bridge  helped  also 
to  lessen  needless  terror.  K  on  the  one  hand, 
the  shielding  of  one's  eyes  tends  to  sharpen 
the  sense  of  peril,  on  the  other  hand  it  may 
graciously  mitigate  fear.  When  a  sight  be- 
comes too  painful,  instinct  prompts  us  to  shut 
a  door  against  it.  More  than  once,  leaning 
over  the  parapet  of  a  bridge  and  watching  the 
rage  of  water  beneath,  I  have  wondered  that 
any  structure  contrived  by  mortals  could  with- 
stand the  rush.  It  seemed  that  the  bridge 
must  give  way,  as  such  spans  have  done. 
Mercy  would  have  covered  my  eyes.  And 
the  wooden  sheathing  did  that.  It  gave  sense 
of  protection  and  safety.  It  let  the  passenger 
continue  his  journey  un weakened  by  fright. 
There  is  a  fear  that  paralyzes  its  victim — as 
a  bird  transfixed  by  the  evil  eye  of  a  reptile, 


172  CROSS-LOTS 

as  a  horse  in  the  presence  of  jungle  beasts. 
Even  the  instinct  of  flight  seems  killed  under 
such  conditions.  Fear,  at  its  worst,  robs  the 
brain  of  its  cunning  and  the  will  of  its  power. 
"I  was  afraid,"  pleaded  the  unfaithful  steward, 
in  extenuation  of  his  wretched  accounting. 
*'Fear  hath  torment" — and  worse.  It  cuts  all 
the  nerves  of  honor  and  truth.  In  a  trice  it 
drives  out  of  human  souls  all  the  laborious 
acquisitions  of  ages  of  civilization.  And,  in  its 
way,  whether  of  set  purpose  or  not,  the  bridge- 
covering  helped  to  countervail  that  peril.  At 
the  least  it  muffled  the  rush  of  water  beneath, 
and  sheltered  from  the  fury  of  the  tempest. 
To  do  that  anywhere  for  timid  pilgrims,  to 
make  possible  a  continuation  of  the  journey 
in  courage  and  cheer,  to  help  allay  the  panics 
of  the  soul  is  a  rich  human  service. 

Moreover  (I  can  write  in  personal  terms 
only),  the  old  covered  bridge  was  a  homelike 
affair.  Nowhere  else  seemed  the  shadows  so 
kind  and  cool,  and  a  rendezvous  with  daydreams 
so  certain.  Down  by  the  margin  of  the  river, 
against  the  moss-softened  abutments,  what  a 
tryst  for  a  lad  with  his  better  self!  Sanctuary 
hours  they.  Fishing-pole,  water-wheel,  toy 
craft — or  just  abundance  of  pebbles  handy — I 
remember  them  all.  I  cannot  imagine  feeling 
at  home  by  the  huge  piers  of  a  modern  bridge. 


THE  OLD  COVERED  BRIDGE         173 

Some  years  ago  I  traveled  a  good  many  miles 
to  stand  beneath  the  span  of  one  of  England's 
most  famous  bridges.  Any  Britisher  ought  to 
be  proud  of  the  structure.  I  was  myself. 
But  I  lacked  the  first  impulse  to  be  familiar 
with  it,  to  nestle  against  its  massive  stonework. 
I  should  as  soon  have  tried  to  make  friends 
with  an  obelisk  or  the  dome  on  Saint  Paul's. 
Leave  such  forwardness  to  spirits  more  venture- 
some than  mine.  But  with  a  right  good  grace 
and  a  tender  thanksgiving,  not  to  say  a  mo- 
mentary forgetfulness  of  the  smarts  and  puzzles 
of  the  intervening  years,  I  could  take  my  old 
place  beneath  the  weather-worn  timbers  of  the 
old  dear  bridge  where  a  modest  river  leisurely 
seeks  the  sea.  Alas,  that  the  shrine  is  gone! 
One  more  look,  and  that  through  the  echoing 
shed  of  the  old  covered  bridge.  Was  ever 
another  vista  quite  so  alluring  as  that  glimpsed 
through  such  tunnel  of  wood?  Or  other  fields 
quite  so  green?  Or  sunlight  on  hills  or  road 
so  dazzling?  Without  the  covering  one  sees 
too  much  sky  or  landscape,  and  so  finds  it  a 
commonplace.  Ordinarily,  in  life,  the  horizon 
is  so  wide  that  our  eyes  are  holden.  What  the 
artist  catches  for  his  canvas  is  the  particular 
view  we  missed.  What  Wordsworth  and  Bums 
put  into  their  poetry  was  the  glory  that  escaped 
us  on  the  road.     What  MacDowell  gave  us 


174  CROSS-LOTS 

in  his  music  is  usually  some  exquisite,  un- 
ambitious bit  of  harmony  caught  out  of  the 
music  of  the  spheres.  Ordinarily,  one  needs  to 
narrow  his  field  of  vision  if  he  is  to  see  with 
rapture,  as  when  a  single  face  seems  to  fill 
the  world  for  an  ardent  lover.  So  the  old 
covered  bridge  helped  both  eyes  and  heart 
to  find  focus,  framing  absorbingly  some  patch 
of  sky  or  woods — or  a  house  just  beyond  the 
margin  of  the  stream. 

Particularly  that,  perhaps.  When  the  house 
at  the  further  side  of  the  stream  is  home,  and 
one  approaches  it  through  the  shade  of  the 
old  covered  bridge,  each  noisy  footfall  measur- 
ing progress  for  the  heart,  the  last  part  of  the 
journey  is  set  to  music.  Sometimes  life  yields 
us  that.  Beneath  are  waters  that  we  hear 
rather  than  see.  Overhead  is  the  vast  canopy 
of  radiant  blue,  or  storm  clouds  pelting  angrily 
— and  the  kindly  bridge-shed  between.  Just 
beyond  the  end  of  the  bridge,  bathed  in  sun- 
shine or  half  hidden  by  mists,  or  with  a  wel- 
come light  in  the  window,  are  comradeship  and 
refreshment  and  peace — in  the  house  on  yonder 
side  of  the  stream. 


XV 

WHEN  THE  SCAFFOLDING 
COMES  DOWN 

I  SUPPOSE  that  scaffoldings  are  a  necessary 
evil.  I  have  watched  them  grow,  and  stand, 
and  come  down.  And  I  always  accepted  them 
as  a  matter  of  course.  I  suppose  also  that  the 
builder,  and  certainly  the  architect,  can  see 
the  building  through  and  in  spite  of  the  clumsy- 
looking  structure  that  veils  the  rising  walls. 
And  I  suppose,  still  further,  that,  in  a  way, 
and  considering  the  purpose  it  serves,  a  scaf- 
folding may  be  a  thing  of  beauty  if  not  a  joy 
forever.  But  for  the  rest  of  us  such  a  rough 
contraption  of  scantling  and  timber  is  a  very 
great  expense,  a  hiding  medium,  an  eyesore. 
Pity  that  a  church  or  courthouse  or  office 
building  can't  just  "grow"  without  sound  of 
hammer  or  litter  of  lumber — as  the  palace  did 
when  Aladdin  rubbed  his  wonderful  lamp. 
Everybody  owns  such  a  lamp — or  he  is  poor 
indeed.  And  he  rubs  it  in  dreams  or  waking 
fancies.  The  trouble  is  that,  when  he  rubs 
his  eyes,  the  building  he  rubbed  into  being  by 
aid  of  his  Zamp,  vanishes.    So  the  world  con- 

176 


176  CROSS-LOTS 

tinues  to  spend  an  unconscionable  amount  of 
money  on  structures  that  disappear  when  the 
dreams  come  true.  A  day  or  a  month  or  a 
year  the  scaffolding  stands,  more  weather-beat 
and  grimy  and  inartistic. 

And  then,  at  length,  the  scaffolding  comes 
down,  piece  by  piece;  as  if  perhaps  the  hidden 
beauty  might  be  too  great  for  ordinary  eyes 
to  behold.  The  hidden  beauty  or  the  hidden 
monstrosity!  I  have  known  buildings  that 
ought  never  to  have  parted  with  their  rough 
draperies.  What  the  scaffolding  veiled  was  so 
much  more  offensive  than  the  veil  itself,  just 
as  there  are  canvases  that  never  should  have 
been  permitted  to  pass  the  sketch-stage,  and 
songs  that  would  have  done  more  credit  to 
their  authors  by  remaining  in  manuscript,  and 
loves  that  were  nobler  undeclared,  and  vessels 
that  ought  to  have  remained  on  the  ways. 
When  a  man  builds  his  house  of  hay,  wood, 
stubble,  he'd  better  let  the  scaffolding  remain 
to  hide  the  poverty  of  his  structure.  In  a 
way  the  scaffolding  is  less  offensive  than  is 
the  building.  I  mean,  that  the  effort  is  more 
admirable  than  the  achievement.  Said  a  frank 
assessor  of  values,  upon  being  shown  a  mar- 
velously  carved  peach  pit,  "Well  done,  but  not 
worth  doing."  Industry,  artistry,  skill — but  no 
result  commensurate  with  the  labor.     "Aren't 


THE  SCAFFOLDING  COMES  DOWN  177 

you  ashamed  to  sing  so  well?'*  asked  the  great 
Philip  of  his  son.  Some  one  observes  that  the 
cell  in  which  the  honey  bee  stores  his  gathered 
sweetness  is  as  wonderful,  both  in  workman- 
ship and  economy  of  material,  as  is  the  content. 
But  who  cares  for  the  tiny  creature's  industry  and 
skill  unless  what  he  stores  is  honey  .^^  To  work 
hard  and  patiently,  and  at  the  end  to  have  noth- 
ing worthful  to  show  is  little  short  of  tragedy. 

For,  some  day,  the  scaffolding  comes  down, 
as  I  watched  it  fall  away  from  a  certain  church 
tower.  I  had  no  conception  of  the  granite 
beauty  behind  the  network  of  timber.  That 
the  finished  product  was  laboriously  wrought, 
and  imposing,  probably,  and  costly  withal,  I 
was  sure.  That  it  would  fairly  startle  me 
with  its  lovely  proportions,  its  combination  of 
skyward  reach  and  delicate  design,  I  never 
dreamed.  One  ought  to  be  prompted  to  put 
up  a  richer  prayer  or  bring  a  tenderer  adora- 
tion beneath  the  wide  roof  which  that  stone 
lacework  crowns.  Had  I  guessed  the  rare 
beauty  of  the  completed  tower,  I  might  have 
wished  the  contractor  would  take  down  his 
scaffolding,  half  way  up,  to  give  me  a  glimpse 
of  a  partial  glory.  So  impatient  are  we  of 
results — like  the  wee  lassie  who  "just  blos- 
somed the  rose,'*  as  she  explained  her  sorry 
attempt  to  hasten  full  blooming. 


178  CROSS-LOTS 

Some  day,   the   scaffolding  around  the  in- 
carnation of  your  dream  comes  down.     No- 
body else  saw  your  dream.     That  was  yours 
and  God*s;  not  for  any  other  eyes.     All  that 
you  were  doing  as  the  walls    grew,  and  the 
workmen  of  your  brain  were  busy  with  hods 
and   trowels;    all    that   the   bee-like    industry 
meant  to  you  and  to  the  world,  nobody  else 
knew.      Perhaps   they    would   have   criticized 
less  had  they  seen,  on  the  plans,  your  com- 
pleted task;  perhaps  they  would  have  com- 
mented still  more  sarcastically — for  the  world 
has   not   yet   grown   a   soul   large  enough   to 
admire  without  envy.     Perfection  is  a  target 
quite   as   often   as  it   is   a  cynosure.     SuflSce 
that  the  by-standers   did   not  see   what  you 
were   building.      Then   the   scaffolding   comes 
down  and  your  work  belongs  to  the  world. 
A  statue,  a  mechanical  device,  a  piece  of  prose 
like    Macaulay's,    or    a    page    of    music    like 
Mozart*s,  a  new  pi^ogram  of  service  or  a  finer 
conception   of   the   meaning   of   manhood — or 
what  you  will;  at  length  the  working  structure 
falls  away  and  the  result  appears.     "Now  he 
belongs  to  the  ages,"  groaned  Stanton  as  he 
turned  from  the  dead  Lincoln's  bed.     Before 
that  he  seemed  to  belong  to  the  critics,  or  the 
politicians,  or  to  the  party  of  abolition,  the 
scaffolding  hid  so  much.    Men  did  not  approve 


THE  SCAFFOLDING  COMES  DOWN   179 

his  truculence  or  his  humor  or  his  tenderness 
or  his  choice  of  generals.  Then,  one  night, 
at  a  shot,  the  scaffolding  came  down;  and  the 
world  has  as  yet  scarcely  caught  its  breath 
before  the  magnitude  of  the  man  revealed. 

Only  when  the  scaffolding  comes  down  can 
the  work  of  another's  life  be  seen.  This  is 
forever  the  pique  of  spending  one's  time  and 
strength  on  others.  Little  of  the  plan  can 
be  seen  while  the  work  is  in  progress.  So 
every  mother  knows,  and  every  friend  of  man. 
Count  the  days  in  Val jean's  redemption. 
None  but  the  Bishop  saw  the  man  within  the 
man.  And  none,  seeing  less  than  the  Bishop 
saw,  could  rebuild  the  criminal.  A  clumsy 
scaffolding  without  definitive  meaning  or  prom- 
ise of  moral  beauty  was  all  the  world  saw. 
And  once  the  walls  fell  dismally.  But  the 
good  Bishop  wrought  on.  And  the  building 
that  stood  forth  when  the  rude  scaffolding 
came  down,  the  building  not  made  with  hands, 
was  indeed  a  temple.  Thus  Monica  wrought 
and  prayed  and  tempered  her  mortar  with 
tears,  as  countless  mothers  have  done.  And 
the  task  was  long,  and  a  woman's  hands  bled 
at  their  toil.  And  none  but  God  justified  the 
extravagance  of  it  all.  But  one  day  the  scaf- 
folding came  down,  and  the  world  saw  Au- 
gustine, the  saint.     Thus  Jesus  clung  to  his 


180  CROSS-LOTS 

dream  for  Peter.  The  "Rock"  was  not  even 
docile  stone.  I  do  not  think  Peter  could  have 
told  whether  he  wanted  most  to  be  built  into 
market  or  forum  or  temple.  His  intent  was 
as  shifting  as  the  wind.  But  his  Friend 
had  a  dream  of  Peter  transformed.  And  the 
hands  that  wrought  were  scarred  as  with  nail 
prints.  But  when  the  scaffolding  came  down 
Peter  was  made. 

Only  when  the  scaffolding  is  stripped  away 
can  we  appreciate  the  true  dimension  and  rich 
detail  of  any  great  movement.     One  remem- 
bers   with    chagrin    the    snap    judgments    we 
passed  while  Marshal  Foch  was  organizing  for 
the    terrible    hammer-blows    that    broke  the 
German  line.    There  was  such  apparently  fatal 
delay  in  striking;  and  our  hearts  were  so  sick 
with  suffering,  so  faint  with  apprehension  as 
the  ruthless  Prussians  swept  on  and  always 
on,   we  had  hard   work  to  be  patient.     We 
were  angrily  impatient.     Fortunate,  perhaps, 
that  the  quiet  man  set  to  champion  the  trem- 
ulous hope  of  democracy  did  not  know  all  we 
were  thinking  and  saying.     Or  did  he  know, 
and  smile  as  God  does  at  the  dismays  and 
desperations  of  men  when  his  purpose  ripens 
slowly .-*     Then  came  Belleau  Wood,  and  the 
world  caught  its  breath;  Messines  Ridge,  and 
we  dared  to  smile;  then  the  Forest  of  Argonne, 


THE  SCAFFOLDING  COMES  DOWN  181 

quick,  startling  falling  of  the  timbers  hiding 
the  solid  splendor  of  great  strategy,  and  one 
day  we  stood  agape  with  joy. 

And  then  straightway  we  forgot  the  lesson 
learned  in  such  agony  of  suspense.  Having 
seen  the  war  won  brilliantly,  we  expected 
reconstruction  to  follow  as  a  matter  of  course. 
I  think  we  still  expect  it  on  that  wise — unless 
we  have  given  over  expecting  it  at  all.  Staring 
at  the  maze  of  scaffolding  within  which,  some- 
where, the  walls  of  a  new  brotherhood  shall 
rise,  we  are  confused,  fretful,  despairing  even. 
Nothing  commensurate  in  value  with  a  frac- 
tion of  the  cost  seems  eventuating.  It  looks 
as  if  the  blood  stains  on  the  scaffolding  were 
mockery.  The  world's  exhausting  labor-pains 
seem  not  to  have  advanced  the  birth  of  the 
world's  real  hope.  Apparently,  we  are  farther 
from  the  morning  than  when  the  darkness 
fell  in  August,  1914.  Who  save  the  Great 
Architect,  whose  high  purpose  all  real  builders 
are  serving,  shall  say  when  the  time  is  ripe 
for  the  scaffolding  to  come  down?  But  to 
believe  that  the  walls  are  rising  through  moil 
and  tedium;  that  the  lights  from  the  finished 
tower  shall  beacon  the  ages  to  come;  and,  like 
Nehemiah  of  old,  to  stick  to  our  post  in  spite 
of  threats  and  jeers,  must  be  enough  for  the 
passing  day.    When  the  scaffolding  eventually 


182  CROSS-LOTS 

falls   away   wisdom   shall  be  justified   of  her 
children. 

So  of  any  particular  reform  movement,  as 
national  prohibition.  Snap  judgments  of  its 
ethical  value  are  easily  and  sharply  contra- 
dictory. On  the  street  and  wherever  men 
gather,  one  may  hear  any  sort  of  opinion  he 
enjoys.  Bitter  jibe  or  snarling  protest,  outcry 
in  all  high  names  of  liberty  and  justice,  cautious 
praise  or  enthusiastic  prophecy — all  these  voices 
are  audible.  Statistics  from  police  blotters  and 
county  houses,  results  listed  in  terms  of  bank 
deposits  and  increased  industrial  output  are 
hotly  met  with  the  charge  that,  for  such  a 
mere  mess  of  pottage,  we  have  bartered  our 
American  birthright.  To  judge  from  the  out- 
cries, the  huge  scaffolding  might  hide  a 
mausoleum  of  the  hopes  and  valors  of  men. 
At  the  very  least,  'tis  too  early  to  appraise  the 
full  advantages  of  practically  abolishing  the 
corner  saloon.  The  boot-legger  is  abroad  in 
the  land.  The  serpent's  bite  and  the  adder's 
sting  have  not  yet  become  matters  of  history. 
But  when,  eventually,  the  scaffolding  comes 
down,  and  the  full  symmetry  of  the  new  tem- 
ple is  seen,  I  predict  that  such  a  song  as  has 
never  been  heard  since  the  morning  stars  sang 
together,  will  ascend  from  myriads  of  hearts. 

One  further  illustration — and  that  the  most 


THE  SCAFFOLDING  COMES  DOWN   183 

heavily  freighted  with  human  yearnings — may 
suflSce.  In  a  store  window,  this  afternoon, 
stood  a  placard  announcing  a  lecture  on  im- 
mortality. I  shall  not  be  present  to  count, 
but  I  fancy  the  hall  will  be  thronged.  The 
tremulous  question  of  the  age  is  vascular  still. 
At  a  touch  it  bleeds.  Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  Pro- 
fessor Hyslop,  Hall  Caine,  and  all  other  stout 
vouchers  for  the  truth  of  life  continuous,  eter- 
nal, may  be  perjured  or  misled.  Yet,  baffled 
at  every  turn  and  derided  by  cold  reason,  the 
normal  human  heart  keeps  asking  if  the  scaf- 
folding of  three  score  and  ten  years  hides  any- 
thing but  a  blunder  or  a  tenacious  dream. 
All  the  sweat  and  pain,  the  loving  and  sacrifice, 
the  passionate  planning  and  heroic  endeavor — 
do  they  count?  Are  they  represented  any- 
where? Is  there  a  "building  of  God,  a  house 
not  made  with  hands,  eternal'*  somewhere? 
Looked  at  in  the  universal  or  the  particular, 
is  life  better  than  a  threat  or  a  jest?  When 
the  scaffolding  comes  down,  then  what?  Every- 
body has  seen  it  come  down.  John  Quincy 
Adams,  at  eighty,  said  he  could  feel  it  come 
down.  Huxley  said  he  shrank  with  childish 
terror  from  the  contemplation.  Edwin  Booth, 
in  one  of  his  exquisite  letters,  confessed  that 
if  he  could  have  a  single  sound  from  the  build- 
ing after  earth's  contributive  toil  is  complete. 


184  CROSS-LOTS 

he  never  would  be  troubled  again  with  doubts. 
Exactly.  Who  would?  All  we  ask  is  to  be 
assured  of  the  building  when  the  scaffolding 
comes  down. 

Not  long  ago  I  stood  looking  into  the  placid, 
cold  face  of  my  friend.  Obviously  the  scaffold- 
ing was  down.  Even  the  timbers  that  con- 
stituted it  would  soon  be  lost  to  sight.  He  had 
built  elaborately  and  on  large  scale.  His  work, 
his  industry,  his  spirit  of  courage  and  courtesy, 
his  solid  manliness  had  made  him  conspicuous. 
His  was  a  name  to  conjure  with.  The  scaf- 
folding was  a  busy,  teeming  place.  Easily 
would  one  have  said  that  my  friend  was 
building  for  eternity.  Yet  none  had  ever 
caught  more  than  a  furtive  glimpse  of  the  real 
structure.  Was  it  real.?  And  beautiful?  And 
permanent?  Was  it  more  startlingly  splendid 
than  the  stately  tower  that  gave  me  my  theme? 
Can  one  say  as  the  clarion-voiced  Browning 
did,  "What's  time?  Leave  that  to  dogs  and 
apes.  Man  has  forever."  Here  the  deep  heart 
of  humanity  has  its  say.  Here  hope  lifts  its 
crimson-tipped  pinion.  Here  Jesus  Christ 
speaks.  And  their  chorused  word  is  that  only 
when  the  scaffolding  comes  down  can  one  con- 
ceive of,  not  to  say  glimpse,  the  real  temple. 


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